Another Path
by Selector
Summary: AU What if Taylor wasn't a wimp. What if she was just a bit lost instead. What if her power wasn't either.
1. Chapter 1

Another Path

Sophia gripped her throat with both hands. The searing pain preventing her from making any noise. Well, other than the thick gargling sound. The prey had snapped and lashed out. Lashed out with some sort of round, thin, pointed, metal tool. Lashed out so fast it was a blur. Two strikes in each of her, Emma, and Madison's necks. Up here in the third-floor bathroom where they had trapped her alone.

Emma was flailing about spraying a thin stream of blood out of each side of her neck. Madison was sitting on her butt, back against the wall, in some kind of shock, with blood ebbing from between her fingers which were wrapped around her throat, and the prey was standing by the door laughing. The bitch would get hers. First, she had to get out of here. Sophia approached the door and gaped as she heard the thump at the bottom of the heavy wood door. She could see the tip of the wedge that had been kicked under it. She went shadow and slid through the door and found Hebert waiting on her, watching dispassionately. Understanding bloomed in Hebert's eyes and smirk crossed her face. Fucking cunt.

Sophia went back solid and gripped her throat again. "Did you know so many predators die from injuries inflicted by their prey that they are instinctively cautious? I mean you got the hunt in groups thing, but I think you missed that little tidbit." Hebert was looking at her with her head cocked to the side. "With that shadow thing, I would have thought you would be a solitary ambush hunter. Like a leopard. You've gotten confused somehow. Mixed your predator styles. It didn't work out.

"It might not be your fault. I mean since you triggered me in that locker I got some kind of partial stranger affect I think. It goes with the ability to manifest tools, like Miss Militia, and some other stuff. Too many to name even, all kind of minor so far. Three's I think. No mover, I still have to ride the bus, can you believe?" Taylor Hebert sighed. "Oh well."

"Maybe you just shouldn't have expected me to take it forever though right? I mean you cunts are what school shootings are made of. Good thing I still have some hope right? I'm just taking you three out. Thanks for coming up here to a part of the school that no one goes to at this time. Maybe there being no evidence or way this could be pinned on me gives it to me."

Sophia gargled again. Taylor giggled "Yeah that awl went all the way through. Got the artery and the vein on both sides. My tools are tricky like that. They follow my intent. Tinker maybe too? Survivable if you had gotten treatment quick but you have been bleeding out of the holes on the back sides this whole time. What you should have done was apply pinpoint pressure right over the hole, nearly to asphyxia and gone for help immediately. Hard to choke yourself to death though, isn't it? Ah well. OK I have class so, take care now." She turned and walked away.

Sophia sank to her knees leaning against the wall. This hallway of Winslow High was nearly usually at this time, that's why they had trapped Hebert there. In this female bathroom. Or rather that one over there with the blood spreading from under the door. Why were her ears ringing? Oh, people. Her vision narrowed to a tunnel and then greyed out. She never saw the holes disappear and the blood vanish. Taylor didn't know it either.

Taylor Hebert spent the rest of the day hauling her long, lanky, self from class to class and mostly ignoring the teachers as they had ignored her. Her pack was full of library books in big ziplock bags, so the inevitable soft drink or juice shower didn't ruin them, these gave her something to occupy her time as her classmates were not her peers before her trigger had given her thinker powers. Now, as she absorbed material as fast as her eyes scanned it, they were nowhere close.

Her thinker power collated and sorted the material too. Taylor was left with the best and most current information as she continually added to her base and her powers refined and collated it all across multiple disciplines. It had been a week since her trigger. Computer class was a godsend, the teacher, Mrs. Knight let them work at their own pace. Taylors pace was as fast as the servers could send pages to three separate windows on the monitor. She had gotten an IR mouse as the ball mouse couldn't keep up. No one knew about it, her trigger, or many other things, and Taylor wasn't telling.

Taylor made it out the doors of the school into the parking lot full of cop cars and news vans. Cop cars weren't odd at Winslow. The news vans were. The PRT vans and troops were unique. Taylor got on the bus and left. She had a small smile on her face, how did PRT vans and no villains not out someone as a cape? PRT doesn't care about regular crime.

Miss Militia, Hannah, had watched her go. Taylor Hebert by the description. Mentioned by several of the girls that hung out at the fringes of the popular girl clique Sophia Hess, the former Shadow Stalker, now suspect, had been running. Hannah frowned. Hebert would be svelte in twenty years. Now she was a gawky, slightly awkward, sophomore. Not a threat to Shadow Stalker alone, much less with her hangers on. A picture was emerging Hannah didn't like. A picture that was going to put the Wards, Protectorate, and PRT in a bad light. An image brought to light by the hysterical breakdown of three girls, and their transition from that breakdown into shock. The hypovolemic shock probably didn't help. One of the girls was a parahuman and ward of the Protectorate.

Sophia Hess was a bully. She had gathered a little clique and instead of the staff here stomping on it, or her handler dealing with it, Sophia had been enabled. And now they were here. This school was a hell hole as well. Whoever had done the evaluation of this place that had led to a ward attending here had dropped the ball.

All that was aside from the luminol showing a hallway and bathroom absolutely covered in blood evidence as they had been told it would be but no blood being found, no DNA, nothing. It was a bizarre case. Nothing she knew of would make all their testing methods fail so spectacularly.

AP

Taylor sat in the library at the computer looking at the PHO boards as they spiraled into a, an, she didn't know what, some kind of electronic breakdown. She really had expected news of Shadow Stalkers demise to reach the boards quick. Obviously Capes identities weren't as unknown as they thought. As it turned out Shadow Stalker, Sophia, Emma, and Madison had survived, but had some kind of mental breakdown. It was a puzzle. As were these things she kept seeing, hallucinations, really. She might have to see a psychiatrist or something.

AP

Danny Hebert, Taylors father, arrived home and sighed at the dark house. He went in and found the note on the table 'Library, for the internet. Home Late. Taylor.' He nodded and set about making dinner. He would leave hers in the stove. It wasn't like this was abnormal after all. Not anymore. He thought as he worked. He would find a way to reconnect with Taylor. Somehow.

AP

Taylor left the main Library, in a shady part of downtown, when it closed. Her and the homeless people. She slipped up and onto the roofs admiring the way her body was performing. She was stronger since her trigger. Brute for sure. Getting higher in rating as the days went by too, four at least. She was hungry enough to eat the food at the school as well. Plus, whatever else she could get. Even Fugly Bobs fat bombs, three or four a day. The Challenger twice when she was out of money. It was a bit embarrassing really. If this kept up she would have to get a job just to keep feeding the gnawing hunger.

Taylor stripped on the roof, delved into her changer power and manifested the armor she had been working on. She examined it again. Her test had it as heat, radiation really, as far as she could tell, proof. Maybe bullet proof. She packed away her clothes and put her backpack in the cavity in the back plate of her armor. She crossed a few buildings while letting her Master out to play. She started receiving input from every living thing that wasn't human in the three block area. Her thinker built a picture.

Taylor wasn't really intending anything. She would have loved to be a hero. She didn't know how however. It should have been simple, join the wards. But then, although she didn't know it for certain until today, Sophia. Plus there was an undercurrent of discontent from the verified wards here in Brockton Bay. A certain sarcasm from wards everywhere on the PHO. Trading one centralized drama node, Winslow, for another, the Wards, didn't seem the best idea.

Plus, you know, government. Which meant fucked up and retarded. It wasn't the people in its fault, from what Dad said, it was in the nature of government and large organizations. Well most of the peoples fault. Dad also said ten percent of any population were criminals, liars, cheats, like that. Then another twenty percent were lazy. Large organizations equaled big populations so more of those kinds of scum. Nature of the beast. Dad should know, he had been dealing with them his whole life.

Taylor snorted "Brockton Bay seems to be a storage or training ground for them."

"What?"

Taylor spun around so fast she nearly screwed herself into the ground. The figure in the white cape with the red cross giggled. Taylor huffed "Scared the crap out of me. What are you doing up here?"

Panacea, Amy Dallon, looked at the thin, though obviously female, cape in front of her in the matte black, close fitting armor. The round butt and the swell of the chest plate seemed to say female anyway. "Waiting on my sister, Glory Girl, to pick me up actually. What are you doing up here on the top of the parking garage for the hospital?"

Taylor looked around and blinked, how the fuck had she gotten here? She sighed and decided to go with the truth. "The library closed." She sat on the concrete wall behind her.

Amy took a step closer "Powered?"

Taylor shrugged "Yeah. All kinds of them."

Amy blinked "I meant the armor. Really though? And the library? Are you homeless?"

Taylor blushed, never so glad she had a full helmet "Oh, no, though now that you said that my tinker is going all out telling me how it could be. Powered armor I mean. For that to happen it would have to be real armor and not my changer state, or one of them."

Amy blinked, then chuckled "So you are naked right now. What happens if you lose consciousness?"

Taylor blushed some more "Damnit."

Amy laughed "I haven't seen or heard of you. I'm assuming you are a new trigger. What are you calling yourself?"

Taylor blinked "Uh, Taylor?"

Amy laughed again, it was a bright happy sound "Wow, you are new. We have a lot of talking to do."

Taylor nodded then shook her head then nodded again. Amy laughed and laughed. Taylor pouted and folded her arms across her chest. Yep, female. Amy laughed some more.

Victoria Dallon, Glory Girl, chose that moment to drop to the parking deck in the Iron Man pose. Amy looked at Taylor and rolled her eyes "My sister. She practiced that in the back yard until she killed all the grass." Taylor couldn't help it and snickered. When Vicky pouted it became a laugh.

Taylor was unsure how it happened but she ended up riding piggy back on Glory Girl who carried Panacea bridal style to their house and then calling her father to tell him where she was. Then she was wearing a domino mask and talking to both girls after a change in the bathroom. Wasn't she glad they hadn't seen her Armsmaster panties too. They were old and she had had school, no sense getting anything good stained. Fucking cranberry juice was a bitch to get out. She would never be able to say why everything just poured out of her.

AP

"Mom!" Carol Dallon, Brandish of New Wave, winced. Her daughter having a moment again. She wondered if her sister Sarah's son had this much drama surrounding him.

Carol looked up as her daughter flew into the living room "No flying in the house Vicky."

"Mom, Kull is being bullied at school!"

Carol blinked as her other daughter Amy, Panacea, entered the room with a thin girl, six inches, at least, taller than herself. In a domino mask. Amy sighed "We didn't agree to Kull Vicky."

Vicky waved airily "It fits, that armor is so cool! And its Kull's change state. If we dress her right she doesn't even need a costume. Mom, you have to do something! Or, you know what, I can just go beat them up!"

Carol sighed "First introductions and then we can talk." She found herself and Mark Dallon, Flashbang, her husband, being introduced to Taylor Hebert and hearing the story of how her best friend betrayed her, and a ward abused her. Carol nodded at the end "Taylor, there is no question you have a case here. I would also be happy to take it on."

Vicky grinned "And Brandish swoops in to the rescue!"

Carol held a hand up "We'll see how long it takes. I think we should first get Taylor out of there, before she snaps and uses her power on one of these girls. The PRT and courts will take a very dim view of that. Not to pry Taylor but, what is your power?"

Amy looked at Taylor who nodded to her "Shaker because she can Master less than sentient beings for blocks around her. Thinker because she can use their senses somewhat and that is improving. Changer because she can become Kull. Tinker because sometimes, she gets plans for things in her head, but it seems organic, not technological."

Vicky nodded "Brute to, she is really strong."

Amy picked back up "As far as we can tell all powers except mover, breaker, blaster and trump."

Carol blinked and bought herself some time "Can we see this Kull change?"

Taylor nodded and Amy led her to her room to undress so she could change. While she was gone Mark looked at Vicky "How did you meet Taylor honey?"

Vicky shrugged "Amy found her wandering. She hasn't even had a debut yet. She was out walking around in her changed state. Taylor thinks she has some kind of stranger power too. Mainly because people ignore her. I think it's just because the people at Winslow are shit. She and her dad are having problems because her mom died a couple years ago. That school is a nightmare!"

Mark looked up as Taylor came back in the room and nodded "Or the stranger. Wow that armor is stranger one by itself, at least in the dark." The Dallon ladies looked at each other. Mark had been diagnosed as suffering from clinical depression and most of the time didn't input much to the family. Now he was up, walking around Taylor and examining her closely. "This is you Taylor? A result of your change? It's all organic to you?"

Taylor, normally quiet and still that way here, nodded "Yes sir."

"Mark, please, wow that's amazing."

Amy put her hand on Taylors forearm "Still alive. Different now though. Muscle attachments? Strange muscles, like insects."

Taylor nodded "Your fault. My tinker is making it an exoskeleton. I think that's all trying to make it powered."

Vicky smiled "Mom, Dad, Kull followed Amy home, can she keep her?" Amy rolled her eyes as she pulled Taylor down into the couch with her.

Carol sighed "Taylor called her father? Taylor can stay, at least for tonight. Tomorrow I will need these notes you have Taylor and we will see about transferring you to Arcadia. Then we will see what can be done about these people at Winslow. Hopefully before they abuse anyone else into triggering. I guarantee they will not stop with you gone, they will simply move on to someone else."

Mark nodded "Taylor, what is your orientation going to be?"

Taylor sighed "I wished for years that I could be a hero. I don't want to be a villain. I don't even know if I am going to come out, debut Amy called it Sir."

"Mark, Taylor. Well if you do come out I think you need a team, someone who could help you, advise you at least. Independent capes have a tough time with supervillains, hell regular villains as well. You have to sleep sometime after all. Rogue capes, depending on their power set can have a rough time too. I think New Wave could be that team for you. Obviously the unmasking thing hasn't worked out. I think if you wanted to stay masked we could do that. It would help protect your father, pull attention away from him as well."

The Dallon girls were a bit stunned. Carol finally nodded "We will have to talk to the others but I could see it working. Now you girls have school and I know you are going to talk for a while. Why don't you get settled and start working on sleep."

Amy and Vicky blinked and looked at each other, then quickly led Taylor away. They weren't sure what caused this, Carol could and would be aggressive and suspicious, but they were happy to take advantage. Carol turned to Mark "Kull in New Wave?"

Mark grinned "She can be our stealth mode."

"You're in a good mood suddenly." Carol arched a brow then squealed a bit as she got pulled into his chair, in his lap.

"No idea why but Kull opened a whole new world for me." Mark nodded.

Carol was willing to keep Taylor around just for that. She wasn't sure how long Taylor was going to be willing to walk around as Kull for her though. "It changes our whole thing as a team though, something we have shed blood over."

Mark nodded "Not everyone is a second generation though. Already we don't advertise who we are and keep separate lives. You are Carol Dallon, attorney at law, not Brandish, ninety percent of the time."

AP

Upstairs in Amy's room the Dallon sisters looked at each other, then at Taylor who had just come back from changing in the bathroom, again. Taylor eyed them "What?"

Vicky grinned "We're keeping you!"

Taylor snorted "How exactly am I going to school, I don't have clothes. Plus where would I sleep?"

Amy blurted "With me tonight, sleep I mean."

Vicky grinned widely, then nodded "You are tall enough to wear my clothes, or you can just go as Kull. We could debut you at school!" Amy and Taylor spent enough time talking Vicky down from that idea that they were tired. That plus the change to sleepwear, Taylor in Vicky's things, second favorite of course. Vicky left to her room after Taylor drifted off to sleep. Amy didn think once of getting up and going to the hospital. She also didn't have the dreams haunted by people dying because she wasn't there.

AP

Taylor came aware in the morning and wondered at how warm her bed was. Next she noticed it smelled of lavender. Just as she opened her eyes a flash went off and she jerked upright and her Kull armor flowed over her. She sat blinking, wondering when she had started accepting Vicky's crazy name for her changer state. Amy sat up growling then turned to Taylor following the hard, flat black, arm that was covering as much of her as it could. Vicky grinned at her crazily "Vicky!"

The flash on Vicky's phone camera went again and she blinked as Taylor somehow got Amy behind her and the phone out of her hands in less than the blink of an eye. "Wow Taylor. Striker or mover four or five right there. Holy Moly girl you can move!"

"Vicky!" Amy was getting really mad now. Though she was blushing a bit about Taylor being so obviously protective of her. She and Vicky had worked through her being gay, Amy had, however, not told Vicky she was attracted to her. It had come up last night as Vicky had a mouth that was hinged in the middle and flapping on both sides, but Taylor hadn't been bothered at all.

Amy chuckled at Kull in pink plaid boxers and a pink Patriots jersey. Vicky saw what she was looking at and giggled. Taylor looked down "What?"

Carol awoke listening to the girls thrashing around. She looked out the window and blinked at the dark. Next she looked at her clock. Five o'clock in the morning and both girls were up? Vicky normally took two or three tries to wake up. They might have to keep Taylor. Plus Mark had performed like he was twenty five again last night. That had been delightful! She didn't work as hard as she did maintaining this body for work, or the social circles she needed to move in after all, well, not only for that.

Later she watched out the window as the girls went outside to run, still amazed. Amy hated running and Vicky thought it was useless generally, she could fly after all. Carol decided she would have to watch this carefully. She waited until six thirty after the herd had stampeded back upstairs, how was it girls who barely weighed a hundred pounds sounded like buffalo going through the house? She called Danny Hebert and asked him about Taylor going to Arcadia for the day and set up a time to come to his house after school was let out to get Taylors notes and talk to him with Taylor.

She blinked when Mark was up, showered, shaved, dressed neatly, and at the table by the time the girls made it down. Taylor wearing some of Vicky's clothes. Skirt and blouse. She was also changing back and forth. The clothes stayed with her. That plaid kilt looked very cute on Kull. The extra room in the shirt got taken up by something, not breast, in the Kull state. It was loser on Taylor than it was on Vicky but Vicky wore hers to tight anyway. A source of constant friction. Anyway, it actually worked. Vicky should be a dresser. She would have to remember to work the fashion industry into a few conversations. Maybe talk to Parian.

"Girls, I talked to Mr Hebert. He is fine with you going to Arcadia today Taylor. In fact he said you should apply. I'll make some calls. Apparently he is not a fan of Winslow."

Taylor paled "Uh oh. Dad has a temper. If he is already mad at them he is going to get his bat out when we tell him the real deal."

Carol nodded "I'll take care of that. He has a reputation as a tough negotiator, we will frame it that way and see how much money we can squeeze from Winslow, the parents and the staff involved, or their insurance companies. The PRT and Protectorate as well. Which will make them all pay attention as the insurance companies will start talking about compliance and procedures if we can get a big enough chunk of money. That will give him something to get his teeth in. Meanwhile I am going to see if we can take this to criminal charges in a closed trial as you are a cape."

Taylor shrugged "No one knows I triggered. I'd like to keep it that way."

Carol looked thoughtful "OK, we will see where we can go."

Mark nodded "I'm going to talk to the rest of New Wave and we will get you inducted as soon as they say yes." The women all blinked. Mark looked around "It's good for you and your dad and will be good for us."

Taylor finished breakfast being quiet and watching the swirl around her. Things were suddenly going really fast. Her thinker was really enjoying it.

AP

Vicky blinked at her boyfriend Dean after Dennis's mouth dropped open when Taylors story of why she was there came out at lunch. Amy narrowed her eyes. All the wards had tensed up when the name Sophia Hess came out. Vicky crossed her arms over her chest "What do you guys know."

It all leaped together in Taylors mind "Sophia is a ward. Shadow Stalker. They are all Wards too."

Vicky grinned as she got out her phone "Thinker Five at least."

Carlos looked at Taylor. Amy poked Vicky "Big mouth!"

Vicky winced and Taylor shook her head "Its fine. Like I said I may never use it. At least as a cape. I don't mind being out as a thinker. Plus it may be different here but at Winslow if you can tie your own shoes you are a thinker twelve plus.

"It really wasn't that much of a leap. Black female over twelve, so not Vista. The only way all you guys could know her is if she was the other female ward, she doesn't go to school here, you don't seem the type to hang with track stars, hence Shadow Stalker. Since you know her, Wards."

Carlos got his phone out "I am going to have to report this."

Amy shrugged "I wouldn't. Mom is going after her for bullying, along with her two minions and the school."

Dennis frowned "Minions? She has Master powers?"

Taylor blinked "Could that be how she turned the best friend I had since first grade on me? She's a Master?"

Dean blinked "Whoa, whoa, she was power tested. They would have found that wouldn't they?"

All of them were looking around making sure they weren't being listened too. After all they had just outed a cape by accident. Several capes, themselves included and Taylor. Carlos shook his head "We have to report this and stop talking about it before we do any more damage. Shadow Stalker didn't join New Wave after all."

Vicky got the last word in "Like we would offer a sociopath the chance."

AP

At Winslow Sophia was just waiting, in the tinker handcuffs the police were supplied with nowadays, with Emma and Madison, both of who were in tears. Weaklings. The prisoner transport van showed up and they were taken too central booking. The principle of Winslow was arguing with Carol Dallon and the police detective involved. Sophia would use her one call to call in the PRT and this would all go away.

Carol looked at the text message from Vicky and turned to look at Sophia Hess. This just got really interesting. Not that it hadn't been already, they suspected already after all, but with all the emails Principle Blackwell had pulled up in Taylor, Sophia, Emma and Madison's accounts things were looking grim for the other side.

AP

Armsmaster looked at the text on his phone and left headed for Winslow. He hadn't quite gotten there when he caught himself and headed to the PRT building. Another visit by the Protectorate would focus the students and staff on Shadow Stalker. Potentially.

Ten minutes later he was looking at a Director, Emily Piggot, who was furious. And becoming incandescent with rage as she talked to the detective on the case from the Brockton Bay Police Department. She didn't quite slam the phone down. "Get Miss Miltia, Find Shadow Stalker's case worker and get her in here. Brandish is on the warpath and this Hebert guy is no joke. He runs that damn Dock Workers Union and they are the only organization in this fucking cesspool that actually functions. And no one fucks with them and gets away unscathed. That little bitch is going to juvenile hall tonight, and we are going to have to pay millions of dollars in hush money. Goddamnit!" Armsmaster nodded and left silently. Emily Piggot leaned back in her chair and growled to herself. Shadow Stalker, the fucking little cunt, had harassed Hebert's daughter so hard she triggered. New Wave wasn't saying what her powers were but Aegis said at least a mid to high thinker. She had figured it out in milliseconds. Damn! A powerful thinker, ward aged, and they would never get her. New Wave already had the best Healer in the world, an Alexandria package, the next Legend, and now a high level thinker. All that in the new generation. Goddamnit! Chief Director Rebecca Costa Brown would be hip deep up her ass in an hour. Fuck!

Fine Emily, damage control, clean up behind the freaks. That was what the PRT was for after all. Some days she hated her job.

AP

Taylor enjoyed a day at school for the first time in two years. She took the application packet she was given and followed Amy out. After Vicky said goodbye to Dean they did the one riding each arm flying to the Dallon's house thing. They had practiced this this morning. Taylor was still a bit uncomfortable with flying. Sitting nearly in Amy's lap on Vicky's arms wasn't helping.

Mark met them at the door and it became a blizzard of information and filling out forms for the transfer to Arcadia. Soon enough they were all in a SUV and headed for Taylors house. Amy looked at her "Are you all right?"

Taylor smiled nervously "Dad is going to flip."

Amy rubbed her arm. Vicky grinned lecherously at them. They both rolled their eyes. It broke the tension. Taylor wasn't necessarily grateful. Oh don't get her wrong, Amy was hot, talented, her age, and available, but she hadn't worked out what she was yet. If she had an orientation. Good looking boys made her interested, the muscular ones. Vicky made her the same level of interested. Taylor was going to blame modern mass media's objectification of young women. Plus if she ever got there and it was with Amy she was fairly certain the healer could either get her pregnant or make it where she could get Amy pregnant. In ten years or so. Wait, what? Stupid hormones.

Amy smiled as she sensed the tumult from where she still had a hand on Taylors arm. She just had to be touching her. What was that? It was like with Vicky, but on steroids.

Carol drove straight to the house. Obviously she had done quite a bit of research. Danny met his daughter at the door and folded her in a hug. "Taylor are you all right?" Taylor smiled and teared up melting into that. No recriminations, nothing. Straight to her welfare.

Taylor made the introductions and then went and got her file of evidence. Carol got out her folio and it was story time around the kitchen table. Amy had to heal Danny's hands three times after his trips to the back yard and some pretty serious tree abuse. Finally Danny sighed. "So to summarize, you have been bullied by Emma and her friends for the whole time you have been in Winslow. One of whom is a ward of the Protectorate and PRT. The teachers and staff have done nothing, aside from one teacher and the janitor, and they have been stepped on by the administration." He tapped the pile of papers "We have evidence of this ongoing campaign.

"I think five million dollars and all the teachers, staff's, minus the janitor and Mrs Knights, jobs, Piggots job, five million from the Protectorate, and half of the parents assets and we should be satisfied." Danny nodded surely.

Taylor blinked "Uh, really?"

Amy nodded having handed off her medical report to her mom with all of Taylors injuries she could find evidence of. She had been writing on a medical chart the entire time Danny had been listening to the story, when she wasn't healing him "I've never seen a worse trigger Taylor, well, one that didn't kill the parahuman. They might exist somewhere but they are probably insane case fifty threes. Poor things. Just that locker thing alone should have killed you. That waste was toxic, you had open wounds. You should have had toxic shock. I think you have a non Manton limited biokinesis as well as the rest. Or perhaps its Manton limited to affecting you, like Lungs healing does him. We will have to experiment. It might not be strong right now but I think we can train it up. We can use your insects and mammals."

Vicky nodded "You got a complete grab bag of powers, it must have pinged off most of the parahumans in a wide range. Which means your primary power was really strong. Something I have never seen or read about before either. Some kind of power overseer power. A system engineer power maybe? Thinker for certain." Everyone looked at her. She huffed "What? I actually read the PHO and all the material on parahumans I can get. I'm not just a pretty face attached to a smoking hot body flying around."

Mark smiled at her "Obviously not, but that was near thinker level of putting together some of the less wild, more mature, theories from the PHO."

Taylor shrugged "Birds too. I started getting some information from what had to be birds or bats today. It was during the day so I am thinking birds. It makes me dizzy though."

Amy put her hand on her arm. The others waited a minute and Amy finally sighed and sat, still holding Taylors arm "So interesting. Powers all over the place, and being used as needed. Vicky is right too, it seems to be a system of systems. I'm not sure you couldn't grow wings for your changer state."

Vicky leapt up and danced around the table "A week and still learning! And we got her first! Good job Ames!" Carol narrowed her eyes a bit when Taylor and Amy blushed slightly. Yes this would need watching very closely. Intra team romances were hard. She brought herself up short realizing what she had just thought. Amy was, or is, gay? Taylor as well? She watched the two girls. then sighed. Close observation indeed.

Danny sighed "So this isn't normal?"

Mark shook his head "Sometimes, under duress, parahumans can get a separate second trigger. Usually though, they get distinct powers or power sets and that's it. One power or set for each trigger. An improvement in that for a second trigger. The sets are usually somewhat linked and mutually supporting. Taylors are a bit spread. Its fascinating. This improving or changing is indicative of a series of triggers. Powers are normally full strength right away. The parahuman then learns to use them better."

Taylor got out the transfer to Arcadia paper work and looked at her father "Two things. Team support, we can have that with New Wave, and two, I am not going back to Winslow. If I never step foot in that hell hole again it will be to soon. I don't really care about the money or any of that but we should probably rip them to pieces to keep it from happening to someone else." Everyone nodded.

AP

Taylor woke up in her bed, it was wonderful, warm, and smelled of lavender again. Amy giggled "Vicky will be arranging our wedding if she catches you holding my two members of the itty bitty titty committee."

Taylor snatched her hands back. then put them back on Amy's breast and both of them blushed furiously. Amy didn't stop her though. "Holy moly you are firm." Taylor said in a whisper. Amy rolled over and boldly put her hands on Taylors breast. They were making out like fiends when they heard the front door open. They leapt apart and Amy laughed as Taylor was full Kull. Full Kull in boy shorts and camisole. Vicky opened the bedroom door, without knocking, and laughed as well. "Come on you two. We can run toward school and when we get our miles in I'll fly us the rest of the way."

Taylor wrinkled her nose "Eww, no. I am not going to school smelling like a dock worker all day."

Danny laughed from the bottom of the stairs "Hey! Nothing wrong with honest sweat! Your breakfast will be ready for you when you get back from your run. Your lunch is packed. I signed the application. Carol and I are starting the campaign at one this afternoon. You can stay at Amy and Vicky's tonight if you all go on a familiarization patrol. I'll leave you twenty bucks."

He got a chorus of thanks back and smiled. Not there yet but better. Now some raping and pillaging amongst the school staff, parents and PRT and he could work on getting his relationship with his daughter back. He was such a fucking idiot for just falling apart on her.

He heard Vicky saying "They have showers at school you know."

Taylor's reply of "You won't say that after Dad's pancakes." made him smile. He had a flat of blueberries too.

AP

Sophia Hess woke up in a cell in the PRT building. Yesterday, up until eleven last night had turned into a disaster. Miss Militia and Armsmaster were investigating every moment since she had joined the wards. Her phones had been taken. Her room disassembled to bare concrete and six lethal bolts for her crossbows found in the air duct.

Vista had gone off on her and called her a villain. Hero, Villain, she personally didn't care. It was about weak versus strong. That was all that mattered. When the youngest ward tagged her as a villain though, it was a problem. Vista had been a ward the longest and knew the system. The idiot boys didn't pay much attention to her but Miss Militia did.

Miss Militia looked over the evidence as Armsmaster broke into the phones they had found "Sociopath might not cover it. Psychopath is closer to the truth."

Armsmaster typed for a moment then watched the phone roll over and beg like a dog hoping for a treat. He smiled grimly as he watched the raw datastream.

AP

Vicky ran with Amy and Taylor, smirking most of the way. They were very definitely a couple now. Some people were probably going to have to have a punch in the mouth. It was so cute! And Amy looked so happy! No matter what went on with Taylor otherwise, her sisters girlfriend was coming to Arcadia. Vicky wondered what happened last night and this morning and sighed moonily over how wonderful it must be to sleep with your girlfriend. Mom was going to fucking freak. That thought brought Vicky right down to earth. Just before the last long uphill to Taylors house. Vicky groaned and dug in. Doing this the normal way was complete bullshit.

AP

Taylor watched as Vicky was, well, exuberant, maybe, all over the population of Arcadia. Amy was snarky and hilarious while taking her to the office to turn in her packet, and then snarky and sympathetic over placement testing all day. Lunch rolled around and Taylor flopped into a seat next to Vicky and leaned her head on Amy who smiled and nudged her off, but then put her hand on Taylors thigh under the table. Vicky quickly relayed that Shadow Stalker was under arrest an in a cell in the PRT building, she had pried the story from Dean, and they all contemplated that as the Wards kept their distance and two friends of Amy's filled out the table. Lucy and Amanda started gently prying for details and Taylor sat contently, letting them pry. No one said anything about her being a cape, several people assumed though.

AP

Danny made it to the meeting five minutes early and sat smiling firmly as the others arrived and Principle Blackwell opened the meeting. He listened to a round of threats veiled as request, from Principle Blackwell, his ex friend Alan Barnes, the PRT lawyer, school board lawyer, and institutional and professional insurance company lawyer before he nodded and handed Blackwell a disk "That's the opening story on Channel five. They think it will go national."

Blackwell looked terrified as she plugged the disk in and started it. All the lawyers crowded behind her. Carol smiled while the others winced. Danny Hebert was magnificent. He must have worked all night, his contacts too. Once they were all seated again Danny said "We'll take twenty million dollars, and the girls on five years supervised probation and court ordered counseling. Everyone walks away after that. What you do with Shadow Stalker is your own deal, but she doesn't stay in Brockton Bay."

The lawyers across from him winced. Blackwell paled. A loss like that, even if the insurance paid out, would cost her her job. The insurance company would see to it.

The PRT lawyer made the opening move "Exposing a Cape is illegal."

Carol smiled a very shark like smile "Only for heroic capes and then that isn't law, its practice. In any case Shadow Stalker outed herself using her powers to steal homework from Ms. Hebert. Mr. Hebert is not a cape and Sophia Hess is not a hero. If you refuse our generous offer I am prepared to file criminal charges against Sophia Hess, Emma Barnes and Madison Clements for conspiracy to commit murder among a multitude of other things. We have the medical documentation and investigation into the locker incident. We can make it stick. I have the arrest warrants with me." Danny wasn't the only one with contacts who could play hardball.

Blackwell was soon out of her depth and being very quiet, as fish were around sharks. Alan Barnes looked at Danny and Danny smiled. "I know where the bodies are buried Alan, we were friends for twenty years. I also know all you fraternity brothers from college. I've already been on the phone this morning to mutual acquaintances of ours. You really should have treated some people better in all those divorce cases." Blackwell thought to herself, 'and what is more dangerous to a fish? A barracuda'.

AP

After school Taylor met back up with Vicky and Amy. Amy growled "Because I need to go to the Hospital!" as she walked up. Vicky wanted to go buy Taylor clothes and debut Kull.

Taylor defused the building argument "Which one. We can go do that, and then debut Kull. I could use a burger. They would have called you if it was an emergency right?"

Amy and Vicky blinked, then blushed. Amy sighed "There are four hospitals in town."

Taylor looked at them both "Forest for the trees. You're too close to it. Come on. We will stop in them all and you can do the ones they can't fix or who would have bad outcomes. We'll give them your number and they can call you when they have one that needs your touch." She looked at the blushing Amy "You've been healing everyone haven't you? And the doctors are making money how? Oh, charging the patients for your work."

Amy nodded sheepishly then brightened "We can check you out on some non life threatening ones!"

Vicky laughed at the suddenly unsure Taylor "Healer one, Thinker zero." Amy handed Taylor a domino mask. Taylor huffed "This isn't over. You are getting paid for your efforts and those doctors are carrying their part of the load."

A couple hours later and every terminal case in Brockton Bay was healed while Amy tried to teach Taylor, successfully. Vicky was burning up the internet side of her phone as she followed them around. Taylor was talking to Chief Doctors and Hospital Administrators when she wasn't being taught.

Taylor sighed as a nurse led them to an on call room so she could change 'clothes'. Vicky was already revving up. Taylor looked at Amy "So it took you a while to get it."

Amy snorted "Shush you. We both know I never would have gotten it. Especially the nominal fee thing you were talking about. To have you negotiate me onto the staff of four hospitals at a combined half a million a year salary was crazy. And on top of that I get the medicare rates for healing people? Madness."

Taylor grinned as she stripped "They caved so quick because its nothing to what you could charge, phttt, that they would charge if they had your talent. Paying keeps them honest Dad would say."

Amy walked up and put her hand on Taylors arm as she changed. "So cool, your powers are wild, speaking of Danny, how do you feel about him skinning the School Board, Blackwell and most of the staff, PRT, and the girls parents for millions?"

Taylor grinned viciously, or that was the impression Amy got from Kull's face, it was a bit immobile "Blackwell won't last a day. Dad has a Principle in mind for her replacement too. Some guy who cleaned up a school the same size in Chicago or New York. I don't ever have to see Sophia again and make that illusion she got that gave her the breakdown come true."

Amy looked Taylor over as she stepped back, just for health reasons. That long, lean, sexy, form had nothing to do with it."Now PRT thinks you are some kind of Master nine or something though. I think you really ice picked them and then remote healed them. The healing was simple but that is either a striker or blaster affect to do it remotely."

Taylor nodded "And the PRT will never suspect I am a biokinetic two in training. I never had anything to do with that crazy bitch or her diseased mind. She and her sluts thought themselves into some kind of delusional state. Like people with stigmata."

Amy nodded and made a face like a surprised Vicky and imitated her voice "Hebert you are such Bullshit!" She dropped the impersonation laughing. "You will get better too. There is more there. Plus if you did that subconsciously its Master, yes."

Taylor sighed "I am going to have to study more anatomy. And hey! Your power is bullshit! You just know what's wrong and how to fix whatever it is." Amy led her out to Vicky and off to the parking garage. The staff looked at the flat black, armored, cape that came from nowhere, jaws agape.

AP

Taylor, or Kull rather, dropped out of the night sky onto the boardwalk from about twenty feet up, just above the light form the streetlamps, a wide circle formed around her. Victoria, or Glory Girl, carrying Panacea landed next to her grinning. A crowd gathered at a respectful distance. The three female capes made their way to Fugly Bobs. Taylor sighed as the flashes just kept going off. "I don't know how you stand this."

Vicky nodded "Lots of attention to detail on hair, makeup, and costume."

Amy rolled her eyes "Or we don't come out on the boardwalk in costume." Taylor looked thoughtful and Amy giggled "You are naked in there remember?"

Taylor sighed. They sat and a waitress took their order. As soon as she walked away a line of autograph seekers formed and the Dallon sisters signed for a while as they explained Taylor being a new Cape and member of New Wave, and no she wasn't a case fifty three, that was her armor.

AP

Emily Piggot nodded as she included the document the lawyers had signed in the report along with the signed order transferring Shadow Stalker to Biloxi Mississippi and Gulf Coast East PRT. Let her deal with those rednecks for a while. It would make or break her, probably break. That was the worst punishment she could manage since someone higher up the chain than her had decided Shadow Stalker could still be useful.

She read the settlement and Miss Militia's estimate of the parents of the two other girls assets again. Danny Hebert was an artist. He had taken them for half their net worth, got restraining orders, guilty pleas, and supervised probation for five years along with forcing those two little witches into mandatory counseling. The PRT and school boards insurance companies had split nine million dollars over ten years between them. It would have been fourteen million but as government entities they were relieved of the tax burden. A drop in the bucket for the PRT. It would force a review of the wards program, but that was probably a good thing in light of recent events. It could potentially be worked into ammunition against the fucking Youth Guard and let them tighten discipline as well. The school board would be looking down the barrel of a rate increase and would take it out on Blackwell and the staff of that shithole Winslow. They might even get in someone competent. A livable deal and Hebert walked away clean. Ten million dollars, after taxes, which Hebert had put on the other parties, richer. All in an afternoon.

Emily sighed and wondered if he, Danny Hebert, had triggered in the past, he had to be a thinker of some kind, and if there was anyway to get his thinker daughter away from New Wave. They needed a older female Ward now. She would have to look at the transfer request from other directorates. This Flechette girl was available she had heard on the grape vine. She had also heard she was competent and effective. And, amazingly, not a loose cannon.

AP

Taylor looked in the shop window with Amy beside her as Vicky dove in another clothes store "You know one of those little go pro type cameras on a harness of some kind would save a lot of legal hassles."

As Amy started to reply the shop owner shook himself and waved the two girls in. Taylor left with a great top end phone for herself, a flip phone for her dad, and a body camera, supposedly armored against everything. The shop owner got to say Panacea and Kull shopped there and advertise that fact in his front windows. Vicky was thinking about it. Amy snickered and whispered to Taylor "Asking mom, because Collateral Damage Barbie." Vicky shot them a glare, a wrinkled nose, and a pink tongue.

It got a little later, and at the western end of the board walk Taylor suddenly darted in an alley and came out dragging a guy by his neck. Amy and Vicky looked in the alley and then ran to the woman who was huddled on the ground in the ripped dress. Amy took care of her while Vicky called nine one one and then helped Taylor get her body cam to play back the video on her phone slow enough for them to see the strike that knocked the guy out. It was a good thing it was a low light HD camera. Then she rolled the guy for his money while explaining it was normal practice and how capes made some money for their trouble. The law that supported it, and to leave weapons and drugs.

The cops took the guy, statements from everyone, and the three young women called it a day. One attempted rape broken up being enough for the evening and what was supposed to be a familiarization patrol. Oh and eighty seven bucks from the idiot.

As they settled in at the Dallons the PHO boards lit up about the weird new case fifty three in Brockton Bay. Taylor wasn't the only one with a camera. Amy and Vicky had a great time getting Taylor on the boards and verified. Then they got busy trolling VoidCowboy and getting him banned in seven post.

AP

Vicky slipped in Amy's bedroom and closed the door. She sat on the edge of the bed and pouted a bit. Sure, they were snuggled up together, but Taylor and Amy didn't even have hands anywhere inappropriate. Very disappointing, and a waste of time. When mom figured out they were gay she would separate them. As she was contemplating how to move the relationship along she noticed Taylor's amused green eyes focused on her. She blushed a bit. Taylor eased herself up on her arms, eased her butt back and leaned back on the pillows against the head board "I heard you wake up."

Vicky blinked "How? I thought I was being quiet."

Taylor shrugged "Your breathing changed. I can hear your heartbeat from here."

Vicky groaned "Your power is weird."

Amy offered "Weird, twelve plus. That explains it all." She moved to lay a bit on Taylors lap and a lot on her chest. Vicky lowered herself down across Taylors legs until it was a pile of girl, sort of, in the middle of the bed. Taylor was a bit bemused being a Dallon sisters pillow. After a knock at the door and a pause, the door opened and Mark stuck his head in. "Come on. Exercise."

Carol stopped in the hall looking over his shoulder and smiled at the pile. Mark backed away and she took his place. As the girls sorted themselves she told Taylor "Your father is impressive. He had them over a barrel and left them thinking they got a good deal."

Taylor laughed "Yeah, apparently he does that, I hear."

"My sister called. She told me to look at the PHO boards. That was supposed to be a familiarization patrol. Sorry."

Taylor grinned as she waited on the bathroom "Someone forgot to get the memo out to the rapist I guess."

Carol nodded "Well thank you. I know both the police and that poor woman already said it, but all we can do to keep the city safer. Where did that video come from?"

Taylor showed her the camera and harness "I think I can incorporate it in my change state. The worst that would happen is it would drop off when I changed."

Carol nodded "Body camera. Like the police. These have pros and cons. Well, way to make a splash anyway."

Taylor blushed "I hadn't intended to, then well, Glory Girl."

Carol smiled and Amy arrived back in the room "Gods yes." Amy went on rapidly and Taylor let her rant a bit to her mom as she used the bathroom. Taking her running clothes with her. She had resupplied at her house. Her backpack now had enough to get her through two days.

Carol let the run clear her head and sorted her thoughts. It had been a big week and it was only Wednesday. It would be interesting how the rest of the week played out.

AP

Carlos sat at the table with the New Wave capes at lunch "The Director asked me to inform you Shadow Stalker is enroute to her new station. PRT Gulf Coast East, Biloxi Mississippi." Taylor nodded "She also asked if you are going to register with the Protectorate and power test?"

Taylor drummed her hard, sharp, nails on the table top for a moment. "I don't see any advantage. At least right now. Maybe later."

Carlos was dying to ask her about her armor. It looked like a case fifty three on that video. He nodded. As soon as he did the rest of the wards swarmed the table. Dennis, tactless as always, looked at Taylor, looked around, then nodded "Good job on the rapist dirtbag Kull." Carlos stomped on his foot. Dennis fell out of his chair. The cafeteria froze for a minute then laughed. Chris helped Dennis up.

Amy glared at him "We aren't advertising who she is. We aren't hiding it, but we aren't advertising it. Taylor's dad is normal."

Dennis held his hands up and swallowed "Sorry! New Wave, you know."

AP

Taylor settled into a routine of school, study, exercise, which equaled training with someone from New Wave every day, and alternating nights at her house or the Dallons. They also patrolled, normally with an older member of New Wave and often for an hour or so before training. They were catching a lot of low level thugs. It was nice having ready cash.

Vicky never stopped dragging them in stores and pushing them in changing booths after all. She did stop trying to dress them alike though. It wasn't cute. Neither were baggy jeans and flannel.

Every other day or they were at one hospital or another for a couple of hours. Amy bounced around like she was on a sugar rush when her first check hit her bank. Taylor was stunned when she got one too. The doctors following them around had signed off on her after Amy taught her how to annotate charts. Her healing was as good as Amy's on the normal cases. Amy was still who they called when they were stumped, or the case was 'circling the drain', as they called it.

Amy and Taylor were left alone when Vicky had dates with Dean. Somehow though, she always ended up at the house they were at. At the Hebert's she had a single bed in Taylor's room. The grilling began as soon as Vicky showed up. They had had to speak with her firmly about their relationship being theirs. It didn't stop her.

While this was going on they worked to understand what exactly was going on with Taylor's power set. They were beginning to think she was like Eidolon without the limitation of three to four at once. She could use any power she had used before, and the more she used it the better she got at it, very, very quickly. She still couldn't fly and didn't have Breaker abilities of any kind though she could do simple healing in an area around herself. Generally or down to a specific target.

The limit seemed to be her imagination, which was really no limit at all. Her consumption of reading material had reached epic proportions and she was giving the internet a run for its money with very high recall and the ability to meld all of that into cogent theories and explanations. The .EDU sites took a beating. She upgraded to a tablet.

Somehow, she seemed to be contagious too, even to the point of infecting Glory Girl. This was born out as the days and weeks passed and the three girls grades went up. Making them one, two, three in the sophomore year of high school.

Carol hadn't separated Taylor and Amy. They and she didn't know why. She knew what was going on. She didn't have the first clue why it didn't bother her. They were still negotiating what they were and hadn't gotten past heavy petting. Vicky was enormously frustrated and trying to maneuver them into 'hot encounters'. They had rolled on the ground laughing at that while she pouted at them.

AP

January gave way to February. Taylor had her first Endbringer attack as Kull helping Panacea heal victims of Simurgh's attack on Canberra while Glory Girl worked search and rescue until her clock ran out and she couldn't go back in the zone anymore. The debriefing said Simurgh's efforts were not as effective as usual. No one understood why. The three girls saw Shadow Stalker there but didn't speak to her. Taylor thought it was all a bit self congratulatory but Amy told her the Simurgh was normally much worse. This time they had lost few people. Sure the city was quarantined but they got most of the people out before they were turned into walking crazy bombs. Some people said the quarantine was temporary as the Simurgh's constructs were falling apart or reverting to normal or something.

No one put together that Taylor showing up coincided with Simurgh's changing behavior and not hanging around long.

AP

March followed February as normal and the girls patrolled, alone now mostly, continuing their crusade against street level crime and toward improving the lives of people on the street practicing healing. Amy and Taylor gave everyone they treated on the street allergies to drugs and alcohol. A drink, glass of wine or beer an hour and nothing. More than that and a system purge happened. Meth and Crack got immediate purges. Marijuana got the same as alcohol. A buzz fine, wasted and purge. The rest of New Wave and the Wards had gotten in on the street level crime prevention and the prosecutors for the city, state and county were seizing property and filling jails left and right.

Taylor and Amy had started playing with bugs and small mammals, and modified quite a few. It's amazing what squirrels and rats could see and hear. Amy had even made a breakthrough and made some that increased Taylors range. First bugs, then the small mammals. Taylor found she could use birds but it made her dizzy. Vicky decided she was prejudiced against flight.

The upshot of all this experimentation was a deeper understanding of Amy's truly terrifying power that the girls kept strictly to themselves, and hours of conversation and study into what she could do with brains. She had started looking at but not modifying the brains of everyone she healed. Hence the healing of random people on the street. The allergy to drugs was her working up to affecting brains.

They also modified a bunch of black widow spiders to produce silk of a strength never seen before and limpets to make the material their teeth were made of, modified for more strength, in plates, to order. All of New Wave got new armor. Carol liked hers even better as it was organic and didn't interfere with her powers at all. Her blades just formed above it if it was in skin contact with her. The greyish silk and teeth material plates wern't exactly what they hoped for color wise but it was warm, water, knife, and bullet proof. The teeth material plates could be spray painted on and they wore enough of them that they were nearly fully covered, except for the joints, so that ended the discussion. The Moms, Carol and Sarah, decided. Everyone wore the suits. Except Taylor, whose change to her armored form got more and more refined with cutting edges appearing along her arms and legs. If you didn't have a Taylor Amy suit you were in danger from her if she went full change. She could also pull it off in seconds now so normally walked around in her normal self. In clothes a size to large with stretch waist bands.

She was maturing as well and had turned a few heads, male and female. So did Amy. Vicky spent a lot of time guarding those two and running off suitors. The pair rolled their eyes a lot. They hadn't gotten any farther than some making out, well a lot of making out, and Vicky wasn't letting anyone in there before they decided what they were to each other. Amy and Taylor thought it was sweet, stupid and a bit domineering, but sweet. Vicky was both of their jealous girlfriend.

Carol and Danny, after some conversation, decided everything was fine with Amy and Taylor so left it alone. Maybe why the relationship trundled along on low but building heat. No pressure from parents or peers.

Kull's threat assessment was upgraded in PRT records to include level five biokinesis. Still no one put together her appearance and Simurgh's pattern break.

March passed in a blur of warming but wild weather, and Taylor texting the police as to where criminal activity was happening every few minutes, subconsciously, sort of on thinker auto pilot. Her range extender creatures she and Amy had worked on were spreading. Her thinker rating was steadily climbing. The criminal activity was steadily declining but the incidents becoming more serious as the general scum was literally policed up. The players left were smarter and harder. They improved about as fast as the new generation of New Wave did. They also carried more money.

The rest of the New Wave was busy too, as were the DWU. In the case of New Wave, Mark was still going strong training the youngest generation and Carol had taken Canary's case. Dragon, a Canadian cape, and ranking member of the Guild built Canary a mask that filtered her power. Carol built a case against her boyfriend. The one who had attempted to rob her and when she told him to go fuck himself cut off his cock and shoved it up his ass. It was horrible. The girls giggled about it for hours and felt guilty for seconds when they found out.

Taylor was getting more and more information on the gangs in the city. The girls plotted all the information out. Amy snorted "Can the PRT not do analysis. This isn't even complicated work. It's as plain as can be something bad is building, probably a turf war and now Lung has this bizarre woman, Bakuda, in addition to Oni Li."

Vicky nodded "And he was bad enough. I think the Merchants would get crushed, never count a man out that is so high he doesn't know he is dead though."

Taylor snorted and fist bumped Vicky "I'll just keep wearing my thumbs out texting. Maybe we can get with the older folks and start preplanning some operations just in case. I'll talk to Dad too. The Merchants are right on top of the DWU. Empire Eighty Eight are just happy Nazi's? That doesn't seem reasonable."

AP

Taylor, as was now normal, led the patrol as she was the center of the running planning while her creatures fed her information. Vicky flew cover, Amy trailed Taylor by a few feet and tried to keep watch on their rear and flanks. Something was going on downton and the New Wave patrol was headed in that direction. This time Taylor was running and jumping roof to roof while Vicky flew with Amy.

They all met on a roof that was in the middle of the disturbance that was bothering the creatures and waited, looking around and listening alertly.

Three floors below them Lung was gathering ABB members and issuing orders to hunt down the 'kids'. Taylor arched a brow at Vicky and Amy and they decided to nip this in the bud. Amy fired off a text to the PRT. Lung walked away around the corner. Vicky and Taylor dropped to the street and ran through the ABB thugs in seconds. They were standing there taking stock when Lung came back around the corner of the building and roared at them incoherently. Vicky held up a hand "Wait! You can't just kill kids!"

Lung roared some more and charged. Taylor danced out of the way and her armor began changing to the full, deadly, Kull. Vicky hit Lung with three good punches, which, while slowing him, didn't stop him and started him changing. Taylor yelled at Vicky "We can't let him fully change!" She darted in and drove him back with brutal, high powered slashing attacks of arms and legs. He healed in front of their eyes.

Things ramped up from there and they fought down the street getting nearly as good as they got and destroying derelict store fronts. Taylor, furious and afraid for herself and Vicky, exercised her power and swarms of insects and rodents rose up and attacked Lung. In the breathing space this allowed she looked at Vicky "We are going to have to go lethal and now. He fought an Endbringer to a standstill. He will kill us."

Vicky nodded "How?"

Taylor watched as Lung started using fire on her swarms. She noticed that there were zones where, as he grew, his scales didn't cover, or didn't cover as thickly. "You get his attention. I am going in from behind and will work on those areas where he is growing. If that doesn't work we will disengage. You pick up Amy and get the hell out of here. I'll run."

Amy meanwhile had dropped to the street and put the ABB thugs to sleep and rolled them. She stayed back keeping an eye on their rear.

Vicky nodded and steeled herself, then took off gaining speed and altitude. Taylor was directing every bug and rodent she could influence at Lung. Lung by now was a twelve-foot-tall dragon thing flinging fire in all directions.

Vicky hit in the midst of a dense wave with a noise like a train wreck. Taylor shot in and launched a series of kicks aimed at legs and arms. She also used her bladed forearms on the largest area of thinned scales on Lungs torso. She was shocked when her bladed left leg took Lungs right leg off at the thigh and her rigt forearm swept through Lungs torso buried nearly to her elbow.

There was a great scream and Lung went down in a splash of blood. Vicky and Taylor froze looking at each other and Oni Lee teleported in with a knife. Before he could slash at either girl Amy landed on his shoulders with both feet and gripped his face sending him into unconsciousness.

The girls were still looking at each other when Armsmaster rolled up on his tinker tech motorcycle and Miss Militia lead a PRT squad up from the other direction. They immediately foamed Oni Lee and Lung.

Armsmaster looked at Taylor "Are you going to fight me?"

Taylor held up a finger "Give me a minute, then if you want me to kick your ass I will." Vicky and Amy snorted while Armsmaster bristled. Taylor glared at him "Don't be a dick then. Vicky can you get our gear? I want to look at the recordings. I can't figure out why Lung just hulked out on us."

Armsmaster's lips thinned down under his mask "Maybe because you took out his minions in his territory?"

Taylor rolled her eyes "Did you not get our text? He was talking about killing kids, you guys were fucking off somewhere, and we just knocked them out."

Amy walked over to Taylor after returning with Vicky and handed her her phone which was running the video wirelessly. Miss Militia looked over the girls shoulders. She watched the video through and then watched Vicky and Amys body camera video. "That is strange. He was already, well, primed, I think."

Armsmaster asked "Can you send me those videos?"

Vicky took the three phones and worked on that. Taylor turned to Amy "Can we check those ABB bangers we knocked out and maybe wake one up?"

Amy nodded and they walked back down the street a hundred yards with Miss Militia. Taylor asked Amy "So is Armsmaster always a dick?"

Amy looked at her "Kull, be nice. I think he has Asperger's, at least to some degree. He is very technically competent but his people skills are dismal."

Taylor nodded "Another one of those power effects we are studying?"

Miss Militia asked "Power effects?"

Taylor nodded "Parahumans change when they get powers. Generally, they become more biased toward conflict. Some of them wildly so. At least that's what our data says, so far. We don't really have a lot of objective data, mostly anecdotal evidence."

Amy woke up a ABB banger who took one look at Kull and froze. Miss Miltia smiled a bit and got on with questioning him. Taylor and Amy checked the other gang members but left them unconscious. The BBPD arrived and started securing the gang members.

Miss Militia finished her questioning and the three women walked back toward where the PRT was loading a still foamed Lung and Oni Lee into secure transport. Miss Militia told them "You caught Lung at the wrong time. Someone, probably the Undersiders, had just robbed his gambling operation. He was going out hunting them intending to kill them. A violation of the unwritten rules."

Amy snarked "Which are written down in the PHO forum FAQ section." Taylor and Miss Militia chuckled.

Armsmaster looked at them and Miss Miltia relayed what she had learned. Armsmaster nodded. "Lung and Oni Lee will get the Bird Cage for this. They clearly intended to kill the Undersiders, or at least some group of parahumans. They both attacked Glory Girl and Kull with lethal force. Glory Girl and Kull had no choice but to ramp up to lethal force to try to break contact."

Taylor nodded for a moment and then shrugged "We will have to take down the Merchants."

Everyone blinked aside from Miss Militia who nodded "They will try to move on the ABB in the absence of Lung and Oni Lee. The ABB will fight back. Someone is going to have to tell Kaiser to keep his organization under control as well."

Amy sighed "We couldn't just let Lung kill people though."

Armsmaster nodded "No you couldn't. Plus you are a registered Heroic group associated with the Protectorate and have arrest powers. He should have stood down. Kull stopped her attacks once he was disabled, that those attacks disabled him is interesting. Those edges on your armor must be very sharp. That armor tougher than it appears as well. Changer nine I think. Your striker rating will be ten plus as well."

Miss Militia nodded "Panacea gets a Striker rating of five to seven as well, taking Oni Lee like that. Glory Girl, I think we will have to add Striker seven to you as well. Those attacks were more than flying brick work and were hurting Lung."

Vicky moaned "Mom is going to freak. We are so grounded, fucking Lung."

Miss Miltia smiled, her eyes crinkling above her bandana. Armsmaster nodded "The video has been added to the arrest report and evidence. We will take these to holding pretrial."

Amy looked at Taylor and asked "What kind of bugs were in that swarm?"

Taylor snorted "Every bug in Brockton Bay. Most of the rats as well. The ones that5 could get here anyway. I was a bit panicked. Lung is going to need antivenom treatments for Black Widow and Brown Recluse as well as rabies shots."

Armsmaster nodded "Noted. Medical then holding."

The three watched as the PRT cleared off and then began climbing back to the roof level. Or Taylor climbed while Vicky carried Amy. They arrived on the roof and found themselves looking at a blond girl wearing a purple and black body suit with an eye on the chest, approximately their age, on a huge lizard dog thing. She grinned at them and introduced herself "Tattletale-"

Vicky finished "Of the Undersiders."

Tattletale nodded "Just wanted to say thanks. Lung would have had us, you bought us some breathing room."

Vicky nodded "ABB will come after you though."

Tattle tale nodded again and shrugged "We know. Thanks again. See you around."

The New Wave girls looked at each other then groaned as their phones all went off at the same time.


	2. Chapter 2

Another Path

Chapter 2

The next day, after school, Taylor and Amy got dropped off at the hospital with Vicky shadowing them, as always of late. Amy looked at the other two as Taylor worked on a case of cancer in a space that had become their clinic, or ward, sort of. "So, what are we going to do about the Undersiders?" She asked as the woman slept while Taylor went through her system eradicating the breast cancer that had spread through her system.

Vicky shrugged "Find a way to contact them. Let mom work on Hellhounds problem. Bring them into New Wave."

Taylor finished and Amy laid a hand on the woman to check her. "So, what, we get them legitimate jobs?"

Vicky snorted "There are laws about parahumans working in fields and taking jobs away from normal people. We can give our services but not charge for them. You two healing terminal people is one thing a parahuman can do. I can't go be a heavy lift specialist though. Things like that."

Taylor nodded thoughtfully "We will have to get Dad and DWU to look at these laws. If anyone knows work law it's union lawyers."

Amy lifted her hand and grinned at Taylor. "That's brilliant actually."

Vicky nodded "Only two cases here, three at the cancer clinic over at Medhal, and then we are off to the rehab clinic to make people allergic to drugs for an hour. What do we want to do after?"

Taylors stomach growled, the other two snickered at their friend. Who ignored them and announced "Fugly Bob's."

AP

The three girls were in a booth at Fugly Bobs when a blond in a domino mask walked in, straight up to their table through the crowd of gawkers, and sat. Taylor chuckled "Well that made that easy. Good evening Tattletale." Tattletale blinked and Taylor shrugged "My minions sense of smell."

Tattletale examined her thoughtfully and Amy pulled Taylors arm to her chest "Get your own, this one is mine."

While Taylor and Amy got lost in it for a moment Vicky smiled and engaged Tattletale "So what's your gig?"

Lisa, Tattletale, shrugged "I know everything."

Vicky nodded "So teenage girl then." Amy and Taylor snickered as Tattletale pouted.

"Well yeah, but I really do. Or my power does. It puts things together from tiny hints, or sometimes a word." Tattletale shrugged.

Taylor went back to wolfing down a Fugly fat bomb while watching the horrified Tattletale watching her. When she had finished she took a drink of her water and sighed "Name. I'm not going to call you Tattletale all night."

Tattletale smiled "Lisa. How come you didn't respond to the message I left in the Connections section of the board?"

Amy laughed "Because we really don't have time for the boards. We patrol, study, work on powers, exercise, and do some healing. We go to Arcadia, so we get our social interaction there, rather than the boards. Well Vicky has a boyfriend, but still, she hangs with us while we are healing. Then we patrol. We're a bit busy for social media."

Taylor had cocked her head slightly to the side. "So, what is it going to take to get you and the Undersiders recruited? I would rather you were with us rather than we were beating you up."

Lisa blinked "I normally like a girl with confidence. Since your girlfriend is a class S threat, and I am not sure you aren't an unlimited grab bag who could end up ruling the world I am going to go carefully here. I don't know, for myself I was recruited by Coil at gunpoint. I need out from under that but am willing to help. Rachel, Bitch, Hellhound, will need her murder charge done something about. Your mom can make it go away as it was a part of a trigger event Vicky, Taylor your dad can probably soak the cops and the PRT for some money over it as it is really some cops and PRT officers being fucks. That would let her get the counseling she needs. The people that raised her and her power fucked her up. She is more dog than human, at least in how she thinks. Brian, well, he needs his sister in his custody, and steady work. Alec, who the fuck knows. The kid has no ambition beyond food, video games, and sex. Not sure what could be done with him. Probably a low-level player with a sub team in New Wave under you three as the next generation consisting of the Undersiders. Not like we can just turn our powers off right. Plus, mine always wants to be doing something."

Vicky nodded "You can be very useful in planning. If we get a business off the ground you can help with that. Or work with Taylors dad as an assistant. He pillages now. With you helping him it would be like the Huns sacking some city. Grue could work in any industry where there are radiation hazards doing nondestructive testing, or repair work. If he doesn't mind a Silkwood a day. Bitch? Really? She is easy. Dog training. Running no kill shelters and dog training classes. Trained dogs go for thousands of dollars a pop and their owners or potential owners expect to be vetted completely. Regent? Amy thought physical therapy on people. He could push them past where they want to go but stop before injury with some training."

Lisa blinked "All that from Collateral Damage Barbie? You bitches have been studying!" She had a sly smile on her face. The girls cracked up.

Everyone ordered dessert while Taylor got another fat bomb and a hot fudge Sunday. Lisa watched amazed. Her Power was going crazy. It was running a commentary on Taylor that was stunning. Powers everywhere and strong! Increasing as she figured them out and used them. Her powers were a nested system of systems with apparently no limit like all other grab bags known. It was amazing.

Then there was Amy Dallon, Panacea, an S class threat. Fully capable of ending all life on Earth Bet, maybe all the Earths. And only she knew. Outside of Amy's obviously protective, Triumvirate level girlfriend and Alexandria package sister. A girl who had been near suicidal a month or perhaps two ago. Saved by one who just would not give in. Had Kull already been the biggest hero ever and saved the world? The ominous 'yes' from her power didn't settle her at all.

As the four girls left Fugly Bobs, with an agreement for the Young New Wave to meet the Undersiders tomorrow, Lisa's contemplation that an Alexandria package, a high rated one, was the weakest of these three unsettled her even more.

AP

Coil kept cutting timelines and starting new ones. Every time he tried to get a hold of Dinah Alcott something ugly happened. The new cape Kull was involved every time. Worse, the level of disaster in the additional timelines were magnifying exponentially. In the last one Kull had kicked and arm chopped him to pieces while Panacea kept his head alive.

Obviously, something would have to be done about Kull.

AP

Dinah finished running her standard series of questions about the new Cape Kull. Ninety-six per cent chance working with her worked out the best of any known cape. That made it simple didn't it. New Wave, or rather Photon Mom, even ran a contact number for the independent team. She made a call.

AP

Taylor looked at Amy and Vicky lying in Vicky's bed "So are we sure it isn't still April fools?"

Amy laughed "No, just that we are fools. Mom too. Aunt Sarah as well, Danny, Mark, everyone has lost their damn minds. We are going to end up with the biggest team of Parahumans on the east coast. Oh, and they all need therapy of some kind. Poor Danny has been roped into the madness as well. Did you hear how excited he got? Right to work! I thought that was an anti-union law."

Vicky shrugged as she got up to head to her own bed "He sounded certain they could do it. Unionizing Capes might not be bad either. Exercise in the morning. Dad is still being religious about it. Bed now."

AP

Dragon, a famous Canadian cape, and guild member, who was really an AI, called her friend Armsmaster "So have you seen the PHO boards? The blond is a ninety-four percent match to Tattletale."

Armsmaster sighed "What can they be up to now?"

Dragon smiled from the monitor "The Undersiders were the kids Lung was going to kill. I think it's pretty obvious they are moving to align with New Wave, or just fully join them."

Armsmaster sat thinking for a moment while his hands rapidly typed machine code into a terminal, his Tinker skills fully in charge. Dragon continued "Your own report to Director Piggot highlighted it was the combination of Glory Girl and Kull that let them have enough power to leave Lung alive. Alone they would have been forced to kill him to stop him. He broke the rules before and was going to do it again. He intended to kill capes."

Armsmaster nodded "Miss Militia concurs, as does Director Piggot. That is a different issue than a group of villains joining New Wave."

Dragon smiled "I've been digging into the Undersiders. Let me show you what I found."

AP

The wards watched and Dean talked to Vicky the next day at school "Tattletale Vicky? Not a new cape?"

Vicky nodded "We are working something out with them. We might bring them in from the cold."

Dean frowned "You should arrest them."

Vicky gave him a bit of a glare "We don't think so."

"Kull doesn't think so you mean." Dean replied sharply.

Vicky's eyes narrowed and the other wards leaned away from Dean "Kull, Amy, and I. Brandish and Lady Photon feel it is at least worth investigating as well."

Dean sighed and put a hand up palm out. "Sorry."

Vicky huffed "You should be. I'll be busy after school today."

Dean nodded and said nothing. Vicky was busy after school a lot more often than in the past. He wondered how exactly he had screwed his relationship with Glory Girl up. You would think being able to read emotions he would be better at relationships. The other wards at his table, all male teenagers, looked at him sympathetically.

AP

Danny Hebert sat in his office thinking as the lawyers worked on the Parahuman using their abilities to make money issue. He and the lawyers had spitballed a few ideas and one of them had been recovering scrap. No one else had been able to do it economically. That seemed to be the key. The no one else either wanting to do it or being able too. With the million dollars Taylor was getting soon they, a union of parahumans, would have seed money to do that. If they could get the wrecks in the Bay for a nominal fee paid to the town, who owned them, they could then move them to the DWU, who could scrap them out and get pennies per pound for the steel up to half a dollar per pound for copper and aluminum. There were millions of pounds of steel and at least a million pounds of other metals in the bay. If they wrote the contract right, potentially billions of pounds of metals as the Bay had been a busy Harbor for hundreds of years now.

New Wave could join the Union. Taylor could contract the work to the Union. The Union would get a management fee. The workers would get a pay check, the city would get taxes. Oh, by the way the Harbor would get opened. It was a universal win for the working class and politicians of Brockton Bay. Plus, Taylor would make her money back four or five times over at least. If they, Taylor and he, bought the properties around the DWU docks, and then contracted the Union to strip them of recoverable materials and cleared the rest, the property alone could be worth billions in a few years. They could probably get it for nearly nothing as that would bring it back into revenue generation through taxes.

One of the lawyers had mentioned this Hellhound girl running dog shelters and how much the city had to pay for those services. Plus, how much trained service dogs sold for, five to fifty thousand dollars depending on their purpose and the training program and matching operation done. That would be a gold mine as well and they had huge warehouses just the other side of the fence to the DWU compound that could be rehabilitated for the purpose. The dockyard fence could easily be pushed out around them. And they were six story tall brick monsters that had been built by the then new United Fruit Company as sorting, aging and processing buildings. They built things to last in 1899. The building was arched and floored on the arches. It was probably nuke proof and stayed a nice even temperature year round. Well within a reasonable band. Never freezing and never getting over about sixty five. Why hadn't he thought of those before?

Danny got a piece of paper and pen and started writing down big picture ideas. He could have a meeting later with the trade chiefs of the different sections to see what was needed to accomplish those and then Lady Photon could help him match up parahuman abilities to those needs. Then they just needed to work out a pay scale and do the market research to see if some local firm could do the work for near the same cost from what the lawyers said.

Danny nodded. Then brightened. The girls were also due the high six figure reward splits on Lung and Oni Lee.

AP

After school, the girls went on a quick patrol, bagged a few more minor villains, bangers really, rolled them for their cash, turned in any weapons and drugs and then filed for the crime stoppers rewards as they had been and returned to the Dallon's to meet up with Danny, Brandish and Lady Photon for the trip to the Undersiders headquarters.

The group rode in Brandishes SUV and arrived at the abandoned gas station in a bad part of town in good time. Lisa met them and led them in. They all sat at a long table with the Undersiders. Lisa introduced everyone. Bitch, Rachel Lindt, looked at Taylor. Taylor looked back unflinching, and unsmiling. Danny nodded. One of those meetings. If Taylor could establish dominance they would be fine. Rachel finally looked away and everyone relaxed.

Carol opened her folio "Miss Lindt."

"Bitch."

Carol continued "Bitch, your case actually looks promising. Especially after some calls I received from the PRT and Dragon. We might be able to get the charges dismissed."

The Undersiders blinked. Bitch asked, "Why would you?"

Carol smiled "We don't want the courts changing precedent. It would confuse the already confused issues around triggers. It is in the PRT, Protectorate, and our interest to maintain the status quo.

"That said, you would have to either go neutral and stay that way or join an independent heroic organization."

Lisa said "And New Wave is willing to take Rachel." Carol nodded.

Danny cleared his throat "Some preliminary work the Union lawyers have done has turned up a series of loop holes in the laws preventing parahuman businesses. There are some serious regulatory issues, permitting, and licensing requirements, however labor lawyers live for that sort of thing. We are certain we can start a company and that company can hire parahumans. Taylor would start the company. We are also certain we can make any of you Union members and put you on the work roles.

"Bitch, trained dogs are in high demand. I understand you are the best dog trainer in the world. Grue you are a fit young man. I think we can find you a place in one of the trades. Lisa your power lends itself to planning and analysis. I could use those talents in my office. Alec, I'm sorry but we don't have video game professionals. You are going to have to find a trade."

Alec groaned and everyone except Rachel chuckled at him. Brian frowned "Why would you do this?"

Danny shrugged "Taylor has money, the Company will be hers. We will need workers for it. We have people in the Union from all different kinds of backgrounds. We don't ask about your past. We ask you to get along with the other union members and union business stays in the union. Oh, and give an honest day's work for an honest day's pay.

"I have a list of projects we are contemplating here. We need to know if there are parahumans that can help with them." He slid copies of the list to everyone. "If there are we want to hire them. Or we will when these projects get moving. We will offer Union rates and figure out an apprentice, journeyman, master system for pay purposes. Another thing labor lawyers love doing. Putting everyone in their proper pigeon hole.

"Meanwhile I think we can, once we prove your innocence Bitch, squeeze some shut up money out of the Police and the PRT. Potentially a lot if malpractice or malfeasance is the cause as it appears. It might not matter to you Bitch but it will help the next poor bastard who they try to fuck over if their insurance companies are putting in procedures to keep them honest."

Lisa looked at the list and her power started putting cape names next to project requirements. She got out a pen and wrote them down and slid the list to Brian. He looked and nodded "So how about we join you on a contingency basis, Bitch getting off her charges, the rest of us getting our legal issues cleared up and us getting work?"

Lady Photon nodded "You will be a sub team under the New Generation of New Wave also and subject to patrolling and working on projects with us, including physical and martial arts or non-lethal power use training."

Brian nodded then added "We have a boss. Coil."

Carol nodded "Part of the deal with the PRT will be you suppling information, clandestinely at first, then after his apprehension, in court if needed."

Rachel looked at Taylor again "I'm in, as long as I can keep my dogs, all of them. I get to say who adopts my dogs."

The other Undersiders blinked. Lisa frowned in concentration then smiled "I'm in. Coil is going to be a problem but not one we can't handle. Us better than the PRT."

Brian nodded "Steady work would be good."

Alec groaned. Everyone else chuckled.

AP

Danny looked at his new phone while the capes were talking and opened it stepping away from the group "Danny Hebert."

"Roy, how can I help you?"

A moments silence on his end and then Lisa walked over "He might as well bring her here."

Danny looked around then shook his head "We are at a meeting now Roy, most of the way to you. Why don't we stop by? OK fine, see you in an hour." He ended the call and everyone looked at him as he arched a brow at Lisa.

Lisa shrugged "A relative of his triggered. Precog of some type. He wants her on a team and protected, she wants New Wave, or really Kull. For protection. She must be powerful."

Taylor blinked "How am I going to protect her."

Alec snorted "Such bullshit. The world watched you pull punches rather than chop Lung into chum. Lung took down an Endbringer. What do you suppose that makes you?"

Taylor shrugged "Lucky, at the time? Nearly wetting myself in fear."

Rachel spoke up "Fear you were going to have to kill him." Taylor looked at her a moment and a lot passed between them. Taylor finally shrugged and Rachel nodded. The others looked at each other for a minute.

Danny brought them back on track "OK we need to leave here in forty minutes, so let's get as much ironed out as we can between now and then."

AP

Roy Christner, mayor of Brockton Bay, greeted his guest at the door of the mayor's mansion. For their parts, the guest were a bit awed. The mansion was a stately house originally built by one of the shipping magnates and sat on eight acres of remaining ground in the old money section of Brockton Bay, Captains hill, overlooking the Bay, and closer in the harbor. It was four stories with a full basement, all dark wood and all of it full old-world charm. Roy looked at their faces and chuckled as they looked around the entry hall "Exactly what Mary and I thought. Then well, you should see the heating bill for this monster."

The adults shook hands all around then the girls were introduced. Roy led them into a parlor and introduced them to his brother and his brother's wife and finally Dinah. Vicky looked at the twelve-year-old who was pouting slightly and winked. Then she turned her head to Taylor and Dinah grinned broadly.

Danny never one to pass up an opportunity, worked to feel out the mayor's position on a parahuman union and a parahuman owned company. Roy's response of "Them having useful work might keep the damage down." Was encouraging.

Dinah brought the conversation to her concerns after an hour or so "So I can join New Wave?"

Danny looked at her "You mean Kull or her group of New Wave. New Generations."

Dinah nodded "Eighty six percent chance mom and dad would be fine if I did. It's the best numbers I could get. I guess life isn't about surety."

Taylor smiled "And even Kull can't scare everything."

Dinah nodded and smiled "And it is Brockton Bay."

Roy sighed "Hey you! We are trying you know." The others chuckled.

Danny nodded "Speaking of which Roy, we think there might be trouble coming from the ABB and Merchants, Maybe Empire Eighty-Eight as well."

Roy nodded "The chief of police has told me the same thing. You young ladies' efforts in reducing the population of cannon fodder from all the gangs has had the unfortunate side effect of making a cape battle from all of those sides more likely. I have been talking to the PRT and Protectorate. They are of the same opinion.

"So, while we have reduced crime we also have higher risk. It's a bit paradoxical. Then your accidental take down of Lung and Oni Lee was the last straw. Lung should not have forced you into a fight or die. Bad decision on his part."

Mark Dallon nodded "You know, the protectorate and PRT aren't the only game in town. New Wave lives here too. I think we could help with at least controlling the capes or pushing their fights out of town and or away from the people. We can arrest. The problem is the revolving door the PRT has on their prison."

Roy nodded "Just what the Chief was saying. The prosecutor's office as well. With a little work, we can make a jail that will hold them, the police can buy containment foam after all.

"I think I see a beautiful relationship shaping up here."

Danny nodded "You better get the governor in on this Roy. The PRT is going to apply heat at the national level to have capes turned over to them for prosecution."

Carol nodded "Plus if we have crimes above certain levels and sentences above eleven months and twenty-nine days the state is going to have to hold them in confinement. We can refuse to release jurisdiction. No one does because housing parahuman criminals is so difficult. If we break the code on that we can make the system work."

Amy, Taylor and Vicky turned to Dinah as the adults got deep into those issues. Dinah got out her notebook and showed the others her standard questions. The ones she used to refine issues and try to get answers. The girls made some suggestions, then Taylor shrugged "We need to get you and Tattletale together. She could tell you how to make your power sing with a little exposure to it."

The conversations trotted along in their separate paths and the girls all got Dinah's contact info and put her in the group email on their phones. The meeting finally broke up with both sides going away happy. Dinah had some work to do on a name and costume and then they would debut her. Meanwhile she would start coming to training sessions to integrate with the group.

On the way back to the Dallon's Taylor sighed "We need a big space we can use for training."

Danny nodded "And housing too if you keep collecting capes. Housing for them and their families in case things get dicey and we need to pull everyone together. We have lots of buildings and more near us. I'll see what we can come up with. For now, if we have a problem the yard can be secured and the Union Hall has two floors of dormitory for transient workers. Barracks type housing but it would work in a pinch."

Carol nodded "All good ideas. Meanwhile I am going to have to work on Canary and Bitch."

Mark nodded "I'll keep working on the training and organization."

Vicky shrugged "Patrolling for us then."

AP

Taylor lay in bed with Amy snuggled into her and Vicky laying on the foot of the bed later. Carol stuck her head in the door and looked at them then grinned at the pouting Vicky. Vicky rolled her eyes "It's not funny mom. They won't take advantage at all!"

Carol laughed "Which is why Dean doesn't get sleep overs and Taylor does." Vicky's mouth dropped open in shock as the other two laughed themselves silly. Carol let it go on for a few minutes then said "All right, it wasn't that funny. Sleep girls. School tomorrow then training with the Undersiders, and whatever Dinah is going to be." She pulled back and shut the door as the girls started calling out names for Dinah.

AP

Taylors eyes popped open and she lay thinking in the warm Lavender smelling bed. The picture her minions had seen came into focus and she cursed. She got out her phone and relayed the location of the bombs to the PRT and Police and the conscripts last know addresses and names where she had them. Everything she had really. She then sent that message and a warning to Lisa. When she was done Amy looked at her "So patrol?"

Taylor shrugged and looked at the time. It was three thirty in the morning. "Maybe knock down some ABB bangers, the press gangs anyway. Vicky is waking up."

"Serious disturbance in the Force. I'll let mom and dad know. Maybe we want to get everyone in on this." Amy replied.

Taylor nodded "I'll mark up a map with the locations the swarm knows and get some lethals near Bakuda. This bitch is crazy."

Vicky bounced in in panties and camisole "Hey what if we dressed like Coils mercs or Empire Eighty-Eight bangers." Amy and Taylor blinked at her. "What? It's the hair isn't it?"

An hour later with her hair temporarily black, oiled until it looked wet, pulled into a pony tail and in black cargo pants and a black jacket with fake Empire Eighty Eight tattoos Vicky looked at Amy and Taylor dressed the same and nodded. Taylor rolled her eyes "This is never going to work."

Laserdream and Shielder both nodded, Laserdream added "Because we don't smell like junkies if nothing else." They were dressed as merchants. The rest of New wave and the Undersiders were dressed up as Coil mercenaries.

Taylor shrugged "We'll give it one try. It's better than a bomb tinker focusing on us anyway. I'll point people at the press gangs, we beat them up. Non-powered. Then we tell the cops where we left them. Bakuda is the only cape with the ABB right now."

Laserdream looked at Lady Photon and Manpower and snorted "Cleanest Merchants ever."

Amy hustled everyone out the door and onto their first targets.

Danny meanwhile got a bunch of dockworkers in on it. The white ones as Fake E88 and the rest as Merchants. All volunteers and in no less than teams of four.

Two hours later Taylor was exhausted and the teams were ecstatic. Taylor had steered them onto every pressgang. It was a massacre.

The whole BBPD night and day shift were still running around collecting ABB bangers. The real Merchants and E88 had gotten in on the act, those that were out hunting trouble.

Amy looked at Vicky "So, that was so crazy it worked."

Mark nodded "Once, like Taylor said. That should slow Bakuda down."

Taylor rubbed her temples. Amy put a hand on her forehead and adjusted her chemistry unconsciously. Taylor looked up at her smiling "So now do Flashbang."

Amy blinked and then nodded and reached over for her adoptive father's forehead. Mark smiled "Only if you want to Amy girl."

Amy nodded "I played with Taylors bugs and then the squirrels and rats. I can do this. Maybe if I study and keep examining the brains of my patients I can eventually figure out what is causing your problem and fix it. Right now, I can clean out excess chemicals and set all those levels to what I think is normal."

Carol bit her bottom lip "We need to get you tutoring from a neurologist. A psychiatrist and neurosurgeon too maybe. Depression supposedly doesn't have a physical cause."

Taylor shrugged "I don't think it would hurt to adjust the chemicals and hormones and even heal any obvious lesions."

Amy sighed "Unfortunately Dad doesn't have any of those. Look Taylor?"

Taylor put her hand on Marks head "Well darn, so much for the simple solution. His chemistry isn't even that far out of whack."

Amy nodded and she and Taylor lifted their hands. Amy shrugged "Normal now."

Taylor nodded "More studying. I think we can repair a brain to its before injury state safely if we ever need to though. That won't save the memories but it could save the abilities and the person. They will have to retrain whatever was there though."

Carol sighed "Thank you for trying girls."

Vicky was thoughtful "Dad has been so much better lately. Maybe something already fixed him."

Amy shrugged frowning "Stranger things have happened."

Taylor smirked and went full Kull. The others laughed. The group broke up in a rush to get to work or school.

AP

Emily Piggot looked at the reports from the console overnight and blinked. She looked around the table "This is real?"

Miss Militia nodded "We have E88, Merchant and a ton of ABB in custody, or rather BBPD does. As far as we can tell ABB was conscripting and the others took exception. It doesn't appear directed, except for the conscription."

Armsmaster nodded "The sites noted by Kull have yielded tinker tech bombs. As have the conscripts. We were able to extract the ones we found in them in the confusion. I expect that won't happen again, they all had remote triggers of course."

Emily leaned back in her chair "That will be a kill order on Bakuda. Cornell was bad enough, this is the last straw."

Velocity nodded "Meanwhile ABB is going to go nuclear on the Nazi's and the druggies."

Emily sighed "I'm having a hard time working up much sympathy. As long as they leave civilians and us alone they can kill each other all day and night. What we have to guard against is the ABB trying to get Lung out. I am going to talk to the Chief Director about bird caging him before trial.

"Now let's get the rest of these bomb sites checked and those conscripts made safe."

Armsmaster opened his mouth then closed it.

AP

The wards had all sorts of stories to tell. It dawned on them eventually where the intelligence must have come from. Dean looked at the three girls and sighed. Vicky patted him on his check. The others chuckled. Well Taylor, Amy, Lucy, and Amanda did. The boys sat there afraid they would be next. Girls got in moods like this. It was never good to be the one they targeted. Even Dennis had learned by now. No one wanted to end up looking slow by the time they were through with them.

AP

After school, they all went to the dock yard and the building Danny had found. It was essentially four walls and a roof. With a concrete floor. Bitch looked at Taylor "Dogfights."

Taylor looked at her a moment then nodded "Where?"

Bitch gave her the address. Taylor concentrated and a bunch of bugs came in and made two plan views on the floor. Regent snorted "So you speak Bitch."

Tattletale looked at the plans and nodded "This could be good. Add fuel to the fire. It doesn't have to be an event in isolation. Panacea can make us look like ABB, Grue can get transport. How many dogs?"

Taylor shrugged, "over forty now. Tomorrow who knows. I'll keep recon going."

Danny looked at the plan "Warehouse with a mezzanine, we got one of those. You guys do your physical training, let me get some of the guys and we will see if we can make a quick mock up. Taylor make this an inch to the foot will you?" He waved at the plans.

An hour later with Regent and Tattletale gassed and blowing with their hands on their knees Danny came in the warehouse "Come on, better if you walk that off anyway."

He led them two warehouses over and into another building which was mocked up with cardboard walls on two by two frames. "This is how the plans looked." A younger man walked up "This is Mark, head of security. He has some ideas."

Later Lisa looked over the plan and nodded. Marks ideas had been good, her power had improved it taking into account all of their abilities "So we need to redo the scepter into a shock stick, sometimes ABB uses those. Regent, Bitch, myself, Glory Girl, Panacea and Kull get Asian makeovers. Grue drives the panel truck. Some kind of mask for him. Any reason we can't go tonight?"

Taylor shrugged "Cage matches tomorrow, big money. We hit them between the cage matches and the dog fights, Take the gate, the bets, and the crowd's cash. Leave any drugs or weapons."

The Undersiders looked at the New Wave girls, Amy snorted "You didn't think we were in this for free did you? Vigilante act, we get fifteen percent of the value of the take. That's black letter law since the early nineties. In practice if you leave the weapons and drugs the cops don't care and the people you hit will never admit what they got hit for. Unless some guy is carrying a briefcase full of cash normally the street value of the drugs and weapons covers it."

Lisa shook her head "And here we thought New Wave was in it for the heroing."

Vicky snorted "All the good will in the world won't pay a hospital bill. It's not like we are going to get insurance anywhere and the Protectorate doesn't cover our bills. Twenty percent of the take goes in the New Wave fund Lady Photon manages that pays that kind of thing. Brandish does our legal work. So far without us having to pay, Amy has been doing our healing. We get a stipend from the fund."

Bitch blinked "Like a paycheck?"

Taylor nodded "Exactly. Though more super allowance sized. Now come on, we have to meet a new member and she can roll some numbers for us."

Regent blinked "What?"

AP

The Undersiders checked out the Union accommodations and decided to move in to save money. Plus, it would get them out from under what was about to go down in town. Three of the four of them would be working there anyway and Danny said they had a building they could get for a dog shelter and training facility. The union had already talked to the town about taking the shelter and animal control activities of the town over anyway. It took a while to get Bitch to believe she would be in charge and would be left alone and all she had to do was train patrol, drug, and bomb dogs. She tossed in "Search dogs." All on her own. Danny wrote it down in a notebook he carried in a leather zippered binder, a day planner and notebook. Lisa looked at it and nodded. She would have to get one of those.

They ended up in a conference room in the union hall with Dinah who was wearing a domino mask. Dinah did her thing and as it turned out the percentages were best for a hit the next night as Taylor had said. Taylor shrugged "OK, meet here at six p.m. Rehearsal, then the hit at eight."

Mark nodded and Anton, the fleet manager offered "Dump the truck in the Walmart parking lot out by Weymouth. After you drop the loot and the dogs here. We pulled it out of the docks by the boat graveyard after that strike anyway. Some van lines warehouse. They're long gone now. We'll leave it for a couple weeks, see if anyone cottons on to it. If not, we'll pull it back. If so we haven't lost anything. Wear your gloves. We'll have a ride for the driver back here."

Dinah nodded "I'll run the numbers at six. I'll call if anything changes."

Taylor finished up "I'll have recon in the whole time. I have a racoon in the rafters and about a hundred rats in the walls. One of them is a relay rat. I have strong coverage. I'll build a swarm too but we won't use it except in an emergency. No matter how Asian we look there is only one Master like that around. I don't want anyone making connections later."

Amy nodded "Patrol then your house Taylor. We still have school in the morning."

Regent looked around "So when can we go on patrol and start making money?"

Taylor shrugged "Now if you want. Criminal patrol for you guys though. We will be doing some more psychological operations."

The Undersiders watched as Amy raised tattoo's and the New Wave girls went to the women's bath and shower room to change and get in makeup. Glory Girl worked the die in her hair. They came back out and the Undersiders stared. Lisa finally whistled "Perfect little goose-stepping twats." The girls smiled at them and left. Danny sighed. Lisa's phone lit up with some locations of muggers and low-level criminals. She whistled "Kull has a hell of a network. Well, come on. Let's see if we can make a decent day's pay out there. We'll start around here. Might as well clean out the neighborhood if we are going to be living here." Bitch whistled at the dogs and the others put on mask, or helmet in Grue's case.

Mark looked at Danny "They might work out. Should fit in around here." Danny eyed him, he chuckled and wandered off to his gate house.

Danny got home late and went up to bed after looking at the mail. The girls were abusing the bathroom. He smiled and used the three quarter bath in the master. He would get the story tomorrow. He was exhausted.

AP

In the morning Danny listened to the girls thunder downstairs and out the door as he dressed. He went downstairs, retrieved the paper, started coffee and lay the paper on the table reading as he did breakfast prep. He shook his head "New Wave must have been out in force again last night. Fourteen different incidents big enough to get a paragraph each. We'll have to ask Dinah if we keep this up."

He dropped the first blueberry pancakes on the griddle surface and the girls thundered through pecking him on the cheek. All three of them. Danny smiled.

The herd thundered back down after a quick turn through the shower. One must step out and let the other in. They had a system though and didn't destroy the bathroom, just the stock of clean towels, so it was all good. Danny turned from the stove and laughed at the three bright and smiling faces. With the Nazi tattoos on their necks and hands "Tattoos?"

Amy and Taylor jumped a little and started removing them from each other them turned to Vicky. Taylor sighed "That is the last time we do that! I can't believe I got used to freaking Nazi tattoos!"

Danny grinned "Sure you got them all?" He laughed when Vicky pulled her sweater neck out and looked down.

Amy smiled "That one was a joke."

Vicky gave her a number three glare "Right up until someone saw it." Danny arched a brow and looked at her sweater. He hadn't seen it and there was an acre or so of cleavage on display. Taylor and Amy laughed as Vicky blushed.

Danny let her off the hook "So what did you all get up too. Fourteen different incidents made the paper."

Taylor sighed "Must have overrun the reporter's ability. I know New Wave started twenty or more incidents. The Undersiders rolled about fifty muggers and minor criminals. They get around quick on those dogs. Very effective. Four different guys, Merchants most likely, were trying to rob convenience or liquor stores down in the Docks Dad."

Danny sighed and nodded "They have been getting bolder. Mark was telling me we were going to have to step on them again. Maybe the Undersiders did it for us. We will see. Might have to give them time and a half for security work for last night if it sticks. That's what we normally pay for those excursions."

Vicky blinked "I want in on that!"

Danny laughed "Riggers make more than security guards and that is what we are going to do with you. Any other brutes we can get as well."

Taylor nodded "When we knock off the merchants after the ABB is done with them we will have to steal Squealer. We can make her allergic to drugs. Clean her up. A tinker specializing in heavy vehicles would be nice to have. Get her a little education and I bet her designs would clean up."

Amy nodded "Maybe if she had more to work with than scrap from the boat graveyard too."

Danny nodded thoughtfully "So how much did you girls make last night?"

Taylor shrugged "Four hundred a piece. They aren't selling or stealing, just out conscripting. I have the money and the deposit slips including the one for the New Wave percentage."

Danny nodded "I'll make a run to the bank with Lisa later. We'll see if they turn in their money or if they need a talking to."

Vicky looked at her watch "Time to fly ladies." Danny laughed. The girls quickly cleared the table and put away the leftovers. They would do dishes after school or Danny would get the four plates later. He blinked at three cheek kisses and the herd stampeded out the back door. Danny decided he would have to ask Mark if this happened at his house.

AP

Dean met Vicky and drug her off to talk about the nights events. Dennis looked at Taylor and Amy and opened his mouth. He snapped it closed again at Amy's lifted finger, Lucy and Amanda laughed and drug Taylor and Amy away.

"So, were you part of that last night?" Dean asked.

Vicky looked at him "And if I was?"

Dean sighed "Are you being safe?"

Vicky laughed and hugged him "Yes Dean. Now what else."

Dean looked away "Armsmaster thinks this is going to lead to a gang war."

"Fuck I hope so. I mean how much can we poke the hornets' nest?" Vicky looked at him "You guys and Armsmaster need to worry about holding onto Lung, and Oni Lee. The BBPD is aware of what we are doing and is preparing to turn the gangs back on each other and away from normal citizens. The decision has been taken to get this all out in one go. Not have a turf war fought out for months or years. When we took Lung and Oni Lee down it destabilized the situation. We didn't make that decision it was made for us. Our thinkers and the BBPD strategist think this will yield the least casualties and property damage. The gang capes may not even get involved, aside from Bakuda and something has to be done about that bitch."

Dean nodded as they got to Vicky's locker and she opened it "Dragon flew in with some doctors and a couple of guild tinkers. We got a couple of Protectorate tinkers and capes in too. The PRT got four extra strike teams in. Director Piggot tried to get Lung and Oni Lee sent to the birdcage before their trials. Apparently once you are in there, there is no way out though, what with the way it is built."

Vicky snorted "You mean no one has built a way out."

AP

Lisa looked at Danny "I was going to ask. Our take last night was seven thousand dollars. I have the fourteen hundred for New Wave. The rest we usually split up cash. Bank accounts you think?"

Danny nodded "With debit cards. I can start one for Rachel and give her the card and pin."

Lisa nodded "We have some other take. We can feed it in those accounts."

Danny nodded "Well, once you start getting a check you can just add it to your pay deposit. Accounting could even hold it for you and dole it out slowly. Plus, they can work to tax advantage it for you and maybe even invest it if you really hit Lungs casino for a big bite. Let's go talk to them."

Lisa blinked "You're total bullshit, my power didn't see that coming at all."

Danny blinked then laughed "My power is fucking over the government as much as possible. City, County, State, and Federal. Call me Union Man!"

Lisa smiled and nodded "Teach me Sensei." Then she cracked up.

AP

Dragon looked at Armsmaster and Miss Militia "New Wave and the BBPD are deliberately and in a controlled manner destabilizing the situation. This Kull is a thinker three? Higher I think, with a strategic and tactical bent. Six at least. She realized the ABB was weak and what would happen and has aimed it at an elegant descent. I suspect she intends the ABB to go after the Merchants first. That is why the pressure has mainly come from the E88. Some from the Merchants and a little from this organization of Coils. She is trying to make ABB take the others on piecemeal, weakest first. I would say our best play is to get Lung and Oni Lee through the process as rapidly as possible and then into the birdcage. Then deal with Coil. That is way to professional an organization and has been kept way to quiet. He has ears and eyes in the PRT. We need to look at the systems."

Armsmaster frowned "Putting Lung in the birdcage won't help us against Leviathan."

Miss Militia shrugged "He won't fight Leviathan. He hasn't since Kyushu. Despite our best efforts. Meanwhile he ignores the rules, written and unwritten. He has outlived his usefulness if he won't fight."

Dragon shrugged "Concur, I wonder, if it was put to him like that, might he change his mind?"

Miss Militia shrugged "Easy enough to find out."

Dragon nodded and followed her out "And you are keeping Oni Lee sedated?"

Miss Militia nodded "A gas in the fresh air supply to his cell."

Dragon nodded in approval "I'll have to add it to the birdcage. What dosage just disables his power?"

They arrived in the confinement block and passed through the security measures. Soon enough they were at Lungs cell. They looked through the six inch thick armored glass front of the cell. They all automatically looked at the foam nozzles that were trained on him and tracking him automatically. Miss Militia wasted no time "Lung, if Leviathan attacks will you fight? If so you will be put in a normal prison. If not it's the birdcage."

Lung looked at her "If I am convicted, I will not fight. I might someday escape the birdcage. I cannot win a fight with the Endbringer. There is a chance I would die."

Miss Militia nodded "I see your point."

Armsmaster growled and stalked away. Dragon shrugged and told Lung "Armsmaster does not." Lung bowed his head slightly. The two females left. Lung returned to his position laying on the concrete shelf. It was not an issue in his mind. He had fought the Endbringer to a stalemate. It would remember. Next time it would be ready. As soon as he had not been able to kill it he had known he could never fight it again. That particular bargaining chip was losing its luster obviously.

AP

Taylor hissed to Vicky "And we have to be nearly naked why?"

Amy pouted "Hey I worked hard on these boobs and butts!"

Taylor stood up and led the four girls to the bathroom. She checked the stalls and then locked the door "OK make us Asian and let's go. I swear if one more of these freaking Nazis looks at my crotch I am going to gouge his eyes out."

Lisa laughed "So they can look at the boobs and the butt?"

Taylor sniffed. The others laughed and changed clothes as Amy changed them and then Taylor changed her. They dropped the clothes out the window in a nylon duffle. Regent collected them. They got out tasers, batons and pepper spray then practiced their Asian accents for a few minutes. Taylor unlocked the door after a look at her watch and a possum of hers confirming Grue and Bitch arriving in the truck.

Taylor threw open the door and they stormed out fighting. There was one cape in the building and Vicky went straight for him. She hit him like a freight train. Driving him through a brick wall. It was a good thing as it was Crusader and he could create duplicates of himself that were damned dangerous. Putting him down and out quickly was the only way to deal with him. Fortunately, the wall they crashed through was the cash cage. Lisa started taking care of that as Rachel in a dragon mask and Grue in a kabuki mask along with the already Asian Alec helped Taylor, Vicky, and Amy get the crowd on the floor with liberal use of the taser, baton and his shock stick. They immediately started rolling the paying customers. Bitch got the dogs moving and Grue helped with robbing the clientele and zip cuffing them. Zip strips really, they were doing this on the cheap. Amy put the ones resisting to sleep.

Bitch had all the dogs in the truck, even the hurt ones, by the time the first car headed their direction past the cordon of watchers Taylor had established. She whistled twice. The signal to leave. Everyone withdrew in good order. Lisa set fire to the office as they left. Vicky dropped the people from the office, Including Crusader, over the mezzanine railing.

Everyone was in the truck and the truck around the corner and away before the car pulled up and Kaiser got out. Taylor laughed at the screaming in rage that started as soon as he got in the building. The group looked at the five duffle bags full of cash and then at each other. This was a big hit. Much bigger than it should have been.

Lisa looked at some papers she had in her hand and blanched "Holy fuck, we just hit the E88 main counting house. They had a week's receipts in there."

Taylor sighed "We better tell Dad and Sarah. The Empire is going to go to war tonight. The BBPD as well I guess."

AP

On the rig Armsmaster looked at the situational update screens. Someone had kicked a hornet's nest.

AP

The Chief of Police was in the emergency operations center. The war had well and truly started and bombs, bombs with weird effects, were going off all over Merchant and E88 territory. The BBFD was fighting a structure fire in what everyone had thought was an abandoned warehouse or factory behind the Medhal building. Five alarms so far. That was most of the BBFD companies.

That was probably a good thing, what could they do against a tinker tech bomb that turned a five-meter circle to glass?

AP

Dawn broke on Brockton Bay with columns of smoke rising here and there over the city. Six of the seven major gangs in the city were exhausted and broke contact to regroup. The seventh, the DWU, held their ground as they had not participated in the nights, festivities, perhaps. They sent out work crews to survey the damage and conduct emergency repairs to infrastructure.

The Brockton Bay gang, or the BBPD and BBFD as it were, left skeleton crews of fire fighters stirring the ashes of the fires and putting out hot spots while the departments that they had agreements with covered the city by extending their areas of coverage into it. The BBPD had spent the night evacuating areas they and New Wave thought were targets. They had proved right in nearly every case. They protected the hospitals, critical infrastructure, and city buildings after that. The State police, their associates, ran thin patrols to show presence. They were pretty hyped up and wrote a lot of tickets.

The Merchants blinked at the light and pulled back to find a fix. They had come in late, their situational awareness not being the best on their best days. E88 had gone after the ABB with a vengeance. Capes and all. Skidmark wasn't sure why, but was happy to bite off territory from both. He had paid a high price though, Squealer and Trainwreck were missing. One of the bombs from that damn chink hole had just disappeared them and that junkyard tank of Squealers. He himself had taken a beating from Hookwolf, and Mush had fought those two giant aryan cunts to a standstill then picked him up, backhanded Hookwolf into the bay and established a line. Fucking cunts. Fucking Mush had done good though.

E88 established a line, patrol routes and held. A minor loss of territory could be made up and they had fought off the attack on the Medhal building. The Cops and PRT had held their hospital, using deadly force, against all comers, except the wounded. A charge by the ABB and then one by the Merchants meeting automatic weapons fire after one verbal warning drew a bright red line, in blood. The cops weren't fucking having it. They had the MRAPs they got from the Army all up and running too. The State police had brought theirs as well. One of those showed up and the machinegun fire would be next. ABB, E88 and Merchant residential areas were strictly off limits. One of those fucking MRAPs had a Mark 19 and wasn't shooting tear gas. HEDP more like. Kaiser surveyed the city from his office window, they had hemmed the ABB up in their neighborhoods and around their casino and that fucking slant cunt had apparently run out of bombs for the evening, That MK 19 with HEDP was probably for Squealer and her latest abomination. It, her, and Trainwreck had disappeared in a blast of black and a gout of saltwater a hundred feet tall. Kaiser growled, undoubtedly the fucking slant was spending some of his two and a half million on more fucking bombs. The insurance for the building would cover it, as over insured as the damn thing was, but it was the principle!

Bakuda screamed, raved and ranted. Half her bombs hadn't gone off. The planted ones. They dropped off her HUD as well. Someone had found them and disarmed them. She had lost minor territory but more importantly the charge at the PRT Building was unsupported by bombs and had met a wall of foam and capes. Then that crazy bitch Squealer and her stinking armored creature had shown up and totally broken that attack. Bakuda cackled, wonder how the bitch liked the bottom of the bay? After that it had been a haze of fighting to hold what they had. Now she had to figure out how to penetrate a wall of containment foam avenue wide, and five stories tall. Without destroying the PRT building and killing Lung or Oni Lee. Oh, and the report was the foam was still growing. Where in the fuck were they getting it all? And who the hell were these guys in the black tactical uniforms with the tinker lasers and the weird circus freak capes?

Coil grimaced at the reports and the map. A desultory action at best. Barely weakening to the major players. The ABB and this Bakuda had to go though. She could upset the whole plan. How had Piggot come up with that containment foam shell idea? That was brilliant, if expensive. It let her defend one man port and one vehicle port in the shell. That material was nearly impossible to affect with powers and was air permeable. The buildings filters were keeping out the rest of any effects that could be thrown at the building. She had stumbled on basically impenetrable defenses, gotten reinforcements and used them wisely in support of the town. A master stroke so far. He would have to parlay with the Empire.

Mark looked at the voluptuous bleached blond wrapped in the blanket and blinked when it dawned on him what he was seeing. She wasn't caked with makeup and more nekked than naked in her clothes like usual. Fucking nice tits and a great body though. Seriously. He turned to the blob in the armor. Both had been hauled out of the bay in the early boats nets "Fuck. Squealer and Trainwreck. Get them to the Union hall. I'll tell the boss. He can get New Wave and their healer down here. They're union capes, they can deal with this shit. Have the Undersiders sit on them until New Wave gets here. They are the onsite union capes."

Tyrone blinked "We got a cape division now? When was that vote? Was I drunk?" Mark glared and he Tyrone held his hands up "Yassuh Mr. Boss suh." Mark glared some more as the others chuckled. Tyrone made three of Mark, and he was nearly seven feet tall. A normal human, brute two at least though. Mark was, however, a retired Marine Recon Gunny.

Mark cut his eyes and Misty, a tough ex MP Sergeant sighed and went with Tyrone. Like any sane person was going to try anything on a fucking tinker, especially one who built functioning heavy caliber weapons from junk. Mark looked around "Well? Are these boats going to unload and those fish process by themselves? We got trucks for markets to fill people." The crew bosses got the group back to work.

Emily looked at the maps and the well-functioning staff of the PRT and nodded. The containment foam idea had worked. Lieutenant Rosalyn Johnson would be recommended for an award for that idea. The strike teams had helped the police keep the whole thing to gang on gang violence and the Protectorate had kept the Capes down, or at least not putting the citizenry at too much risk. New Wave had patrolled their side of the perimeter they were letting the capes and gangs fight it out in, keeping the largest cape presence in the city firmly on the side of law and order. Largest by one but still the largest, now that they were letting them integrate the Undersiders.

Now the expected call from Chief Director Costa Brown and she could get on with real business.

AP

Benjamin Hiram Jones, Big Hitter Jones for the bat he carried everywhere, proud Teachers Union member, new Principle of Winslow looked at the students gathered in the auditorium "Welcome to Winslow High School. I see some of our students are absent. Detention for all of them. Now let me go over the rules, in case you didn't know them…." The bat was a show piece, mostly, it had got him fired twice. That voice was his weapon. He and Morgan Freeman had to be related.

AP

Arcadia was awash in rumors. Our three girls were tired from patrolling, Sarah had texted them a sector at three o'clock this morning. The gangs had stayed well back from their sector though. Glory Girl in the air meant there was a meat grinder somewhere near on the ground, a meat grinder that had eaten Lung. They had to laugh at some of the rumors going around. Right up until the effects of Bakuda's bombs were described by those that had seen them on the way to school, those that lingered anyway. Hemispheres of frozen time, darkness, glass, ice, brilliant light. Some with people trapped in them. Bangers everyone thought but still. Vicky summed it up "That bitch is going to have to die."

AP

Sarah looked in the warehouse turned dog pound. Squealer and Trainwreck were in cages in the middle of the floor, a hundred dogs walked around free next to them. Bitch working with the dogs and keeping an eye on the prisoners. "Well that's a bit different."

Danny laughed "The medic on duty checked them out. They should be fine until Amy gets here."

Carol nodded "Orange coveralls?"

Danny nodded "It's what we had. Squealer was nude and that's all we could find for Trainwreck. The ones he has are meant to go over full self-contained breathing apparatus hazmat suits as an outer abrasion protective layer."

Sarah nodded "What's wrong with Squealer? Usually she is much more animated."

Danny shrugged "Lisa says 'significant emotional event' she thinks she is reviewing her life and not liking what she is seeing. She thinks if we can cure her various addictions before she gets any drugs we could turn her to the union side."

Carol sighed "That will only take a year or so in the courts."

Danny grinned "Well, you'll get scale for helping with her and Trainwreck."

Carol frowned then nodded "Beats Pro Bono." The other adults all laughed.

AP

Amy and Taylor healed the few head injuries the doctors thought they couldn't do anything with. They had made it understood this was experimental. The six Nazi's buddies shrugged, the eight ABB Bangers parents begged pitifully and signed the papers. The five Merchants, no one cared about. The one cop and one PRT trooper's wives signed. Helmets are a thing for a reason. Amy reset them to healthy while Taylor followed her through. Then they made the Merchants allergic to as many drugs as they could think of and cleaned the drugs and their byproducts out of their systems as well as repairing the damage done by the drugs.

Vicky gave them a lift to the Dockyard and they found themselves looking at Squealer and Trainwreck. Squealer was easy, if nervous, and Amy modified her voice box so she was neither so high pitched nor so nasally sounding. Squealer thanked her and blinked in surprise then smiled. Her near drowning was an easy fix. Fixing all the problems the drugs caused trimmed her down a cup size and an inch or two in the hips. She really liked that. "I think I am going to like being in the union!" She announced in a very sexy contralto. Then she jumped around making the girls including Lisa laugh. Noticing the averted eyes made them laugh harder as did Carol's frown. That was a whole lot of hot, young, parahuman stuffed in a bright orange coverall. Squealer finished her mad little dance and the dogs settled back down. She sighed and sat on the table that had been wheeled in for her to be fixed up medically on. "I am letting my hair go back normal and I may never wear makeup again. Jesus, you girls can make a body feel good."

After examining Trainwreck, Taylor and Amy conferred then Amy asked him "We can make everything work a bit better. Not sure how much percentage wise, but whatever made you a case fifty three really did a number on you. If you don't like it we can reset it all back later."

Trainwreck thought a moment "And all I have to do is join the union?"

Taylor cleared her throat "No, we are doing this for you. You joining the union is contingent on you being cleared legally. A separate issue."

Trainwreck nodded, as far as anyone could tell, "But I want to join the Union. I can make my armor helpful! A jack hammer, an excavator, a real locomotive! I had that working under water thing figured out, I managed to get Squealer out of her tank. Then that net caught us. I would have figured out a propeller soon. I just need decent parts even if they are salvage, then I can do so much!"

Amy smiled "OK, we will fix you up the best we can, and you can talk to Mr. Hebert and Brandish." She and Taylor laid a hand apiece on Trainwreck and started to work. Thirty minutes later Amy ask for the bio waste from the kitchens. When they got it, she started converting it and adding it to Trainwreck while Taylor kept working. Forty-five minutes later Taylor stepped back, Amy washed her hands, laid them on Trainwreck's 'head' and worked on his brain and its connections to the body. Fifteen minutes later the dogs all stood up again as the large suit of armor did a mad little dance of its own.

Danny shook his head. Brandish pinched the bridge of her nose and the others chuckled.

AP

After dinner and while the adults were still talking to the new arrivals in the cafeteria Lisa got a message on her phone. She paused then looked at Taylor "Coil wants us at a meeting Kaiser called at Somers Rock. Probably a meeting to establish a truce. Less likely a peace conference."

Taylor drummed her fingers "He thinks you are still part of his organization. Who are the other parts?"

Lisa smiled "The Travelers. His own organization and the Undersiders."

Trainwreck spoke up "Me reporting on the Merchants, someone in the PRT, Circus. He hires Uber and L33t occasionally." He went back to drinking whatever the green stuff he was drinking was.

Grue shrugged "Faultline will probably be there. She runs a mercenary crew. Got some case fifty threes who normally work with her.

Taylor nodded "Go, we need some intelligence. See how much it will cost to put Faultline's crew on retainer for the DWU."

Grue sighed. "I hate that guy." Bitch nodded in agreement. Regent shrugged.

Danny who had been keeping an ear open left and came back with a stack of twenties "A thousand bucks, earnest money, ten grand for a retainer, no more, hopefully less."

Lisa stood up and the Undersiders left.

AP

The Undersiders returned while the girls were on a patrol, the city was quiet, tense but quiet. They were on their way back from their check in text so everyone gathered in a conference room and got settled. They discussed Bitch and Grue's legal issues. Taylor, Amy, and Vicky entered and sat across from the Undersiders. Lisa started without preamble, she was tired, it had been tense "Truce while they deal with ABB. Skidmark was there and got shamed then went off about losing Trainwreck and Squealer. He thinks they are dead. So does Coil. Coil has the Travelers and Circus. We have Faultline's crew but it took the whole ten grand. She will be arriving with her crew in the morning. They will still run the Palanquin though.

"Subtext, E88 is going to try to crush the ABB then move on the Merchants. I think even Skidmark realized it. Kaiser wasn't very subtle. I think he hates Skidmark for being British or something. Helping to end the third reich, some nazi shit. There was a lot going on. I took notes and will look them over once I have a rest."

Grue took over "We have a mission. We will have to run it tomorrow night. That's when they plan to take Bakuda and the ABB down."

Danny nodded "I'll let Roy know. If you can write down your mission we can try to either stay clear or facilitate it."

Regent snorted "We are bait."

Lisa nodded "Pretty much, it isn't a bad plan though."

"If you aren't bait." Bitch added. Taylor barely smiled at her and she barely smiled back. The other young people watched.


	3. Chapter 3

Taylor looked at the plans that afternoon and nodded "Expect some crazy crap out of Uber and L33t. Bakuda contracted them in."

Vicky snorted "Great, we'll all be on YouTube."

Lisa sighed "We are going to have to shut that down."

Sherrel, Squealers real name, and what she was going by until she rebranded, Motion was looking like her choice for a new cape ID. With her forgoing underwear Taylor could see why. Lots of things were in motion around her all the time. Vicky had laughed at her hypnotizing Amy and Taylor, along with any guy in range. Sherrel insisted the girls had tightened everything up and she 'was going to enjoy it for a while', offered "I got a net gun design we can knock out quick. We can knock that thing down pretty easy. I owe L33t anyway, he stole my audio output device. That's the basis for his snitch."

Lisa asked "Range?" Sherrel gave details and the plan was modified.

Taylor nodded "So the Undersiders, as themselves, the rest of us as Merchants, and we will push the merchants toward this disaster. E88 is already watching and we have informed the BBPD and mayor's office."

Danny nodded "Who have decided the area outside the dockyard is a write off and isn't going to protect it. Apparently, it's a fine battleground where the assholes can't really hurt real people. There are a couple convenience stores and a liquor store we boarded up and fenced off today. Joe anchored the bait and tackle shop out, it should be safe. Its on a barge. The only thing left out there is the ice plant. We are working on it and pushing the dockyard fence out to the useful buildings that could be rebuilt. Its a big bite actually. Mark is a little worried about it."

Rachel nodded "Dogs will help."

Mark nodded "OK, let's go over it again. Talk through is better than nothing."

After a couple of more talk throughs they all went to lay down in the dorm type rooms they were using. They weren't starting until eleven. Dinah had run the numbers on the final plan and it looked good. Over seventy percent success.

AP

"No Chief Director. I do not have enough manpower to maintain control of the prisoners, defend the PRT building, cordon the gangs and Capes, then send in strike teams to arrest them. I have eight strike teams with the reinforcements I have been sent. As Deputy Director Renick pointed out in the analysis and using minimum manning and maximum spacing it would require fifteen teams.

"While we are enjoying the support of the local and state police as well as one of the largest and oldest independent hero teams we still have neither enough Protectorate or PRT people to accomplish all the task you are asking us too simultaneously. It has been, therefore, my judgement that we will let the gangs and the Parahuman bosses continue to winnow each other down while we concentrate on keeping the civilian population safe and then work on the survivors, or winners if you will, of this turf battle. To that end, while conducting operations to safe life and property, we are conducting analysis of, and preparing plans for the eventual strike on the survivors."

Emily maintained a professional demeanor while Rebecca Costa Brown scowled ferociously, though Emily was thinking 'Take that bitch. Maybe some of those quiet sectors could give up some troops to the freaking hot zones before we lose another region to the fucking villains. Like Gary. You know, do something other than look good on TV.'

Chief Director Costa Brown nodded "We will see what we can do." The screen went blank. Emily laughed.

AP

Rebecca Costa-Brown looked at Legend "She is unsuitable."

Legend chuckled "She has worked miracles with the pennies you give her. She is sitting on a hotbed. The favorite dumping grounds. Which is also some kind of natural sink of parahumans. The Wards aren't gaining many, that program is a bit to rule bound for teenagers in general, much less ones made cynical, or dysfunctional, by events that lead to natural triggers. Either fund her and give her the manpower or leave her alone. Something about Brockton Bay has always produced powerful, normally villainous, capes naturally. I told you all this path was a mistake.

"Now I think it's out of her hands."

Eidolon offered "A simple fix. Tell me what you want done."

Rebecca, Alexandria, snorted "I don't think your subtlety is up to the task David. Contessa?"

Contessa shrugged "I can't see a path to victory there. Many paths run to, through, and on from there but I can't see what happens clearly."

All of the other members of Cauldron looked at her.

AP

Taylor's eyes opened. Lisa was looking at Vicky "I see what you mean. That is irritating. They are molded to one another."

Sherrel smiled at Taylor "Coffee?"

Taylor nodded and sat up effortlessly, bringing Amy up with her. Amy stuck a hand out for coffee too. Eyes pressed tightly shut, head snuggled into Taylors chest. The others laughed.

Later, on a roof in the self-storage yard, Taylor huffed "Cold."

Amy looked at her "Naked."

Taylor rolled her eyes and worked on her armor. She got it to heat, or hold in heat, one of the two. "Motion and Steampunk got right to work."

Amy nodded "Gun turrets. Nice ones, remote controlled man in the loop. Mark may propose to her. The boob's might not matter. Don't hurt, but obviously not the deciding factor in his case. Dat ass though..." The two snickered.

Taylor recovered "I have Uber and L33t. Just coming in. Vicky, Crystal and Eric are aware. Where the hell did those merchants we led here go? OK, got em. And here come the ABB. Posturing, words. OK, martial arts demonstration. Fuck, gun." Both squatted at the bangs, bangs which gained in frequency. Taylor snorted "These fucks couldn't hit a bull in the ass."

"Vicky's Merchants are here. More ABB. Brandish's group. Uber and L33t are a little panicked. Melee battle now. Skidmark and Mush! Oh, the Undersiders! Photon Mom's group. Uber and L33t look like they are going to shit their pants. We should have sent a camera coon in. Nazi's. A metric fuck ton of Nazi's. And the E88 Capes. Bakuda. OK, text ours to pull back, I see some movement. Good tactical movement. I think Coils boys and girls are here. And there go the Undersiders. Come on let's go." The pair loped away over the rooftops. They had never gotten closer than four hundred yards. Taylor pulled the swarm between her forces and the battle and had them trail the last of the New Wave by a hundred yards. She left a few observers.

The group all met at the rally point and then froze when Uber and L33t stepped from between two warehouses, their clothes smoking. Uber was still beating fires out on L33t. The pair felt the eyes on them as Shielder, Eric, raised his shotgun and fired the net. Uber and L33t's eyes followed the snitch to the ground. Shielder pulled the monofilament net back to himself by a single, invisible in the night, line. L33t sighed "Bullshit."

Uber nodded and put his hands up "We surrender to Kull."

Everyone turned to Taylor. She resisted the urge to facepalm, somehow. She tapped her foot for a minute, looked at Amy, then Vicky, and last Lisa, She got shrugs. "Fine, come on then."

Brandish sighed "You have got to be kidding me." Flashbang patted her gently on the back. Brandish looked at Kull "Some daughter in law you are turning out to be. Can you not go out without picking up stray villains?"

"Mom!"

"It wasn't me!"

The group broke up laughing heading for their contact man. Tyrone loomed out of the dark after a quarter mile, looked at Uber and L33t, who swallowed convulsively, then led them on silently. Amy led Taylor as she kept up a low-voiced commentary on what was developing into a major engagement in the dark with very few participants having night vision. A lot of blundering into each other and melee battles. The buildings outside the self-storage were catching fire as the battle spread and surged. The light they threw created as many shadows as it washed away.

The Police and PRT formed a cordon on the land side and pushed it all into the derelict sections of the docks and the boat grave yard.

Regent sighed "That's a lot of money going to the city right there."

Grue smacked him in the head "Don't be greedy."

Amy looked at Taylor "Camera Coon? Really?"

Taylor nodded "We can make a small one of those harnesses and hook the wireless cameras to it. Uh soldiers? The National Guard I guess. Looks like the Governor voted."

Vicky snorted "For Roy. I thought that was a low percentage chance."

Lisa shrugged "Over fifty percent, but yeah low for us. We decided seventy percent chance of success was our cutoff. It's those bombs. Bakuda is going to get the death penalty or a kill order if she doesn't bail right now."

The group passed in the personnel gate which was secured, then a gigantic fork lift put a container in front of the gate up against the fence, it had a turret on top of it and the whole side toward the fence was blocks of explosive loaded with rubber buckshot.

The group squatted at a massive blast over toward the boat graveyard and watched a mushroom cloud roil up into the sky. Uber said "Conventional. A bomb tinker. Fuck me." L33t nodded. The group slipped in the back of the union hall and up the stairs to the dorms, showers, and normal clothes. Tyrone Led Uber and L33t away looking for Mark or Danny.

They met in the cafeteria about three am and looked at the map someone had posted and marked up as reports came in. The union yard was the south-east anchor of a perimeter that went west about a mile before it curved north and then east again back to the water past the boat graveyard. The line had arrows pointed from it toward the water. Out on the water symbols indicated ships. Mark walked up behind them "Word is that is Destroyer Squadron twenty-two. Seven destroyers. There will be some cruisers father out. I think our bomb tinker may have made this a bit too political. We should stay out of the rest of this. Let the Protectorate and the Feds fight it out. If you go up on the roof you can get a good view."

They all traipsed up to the roof and looked around. Taylor started her commentary again getting her swarm in to back up the troops and PRT on the land side and pulling a sea swarm in toward shore. She even managed a shark or two. Big ones. They were mostly swim, eat, fuck, so fell in her powers range. Back with Uber and L33t she was back in Kull mode. Carol was looking toward town when a glowing dot attracted her eye. She folded her arms and started tapping her foot. Purity landed and killed her power revealing a woman wearing a domino mask "I surrender to Kull. Uh, can I get some help to get my stepson here? He triggered yesterday but he can't fly. I can't carry him because by the time I have enough energy he can't get near me. We would have driven but, well you know, open warfare." She was carrying a baby in what appeared to be a black out blanket of some kind.

Taylor did facepalm this time. Carol spun on her "You can no longer go outside!"

Amy snorted as Glory Girl took off with Purity. Amy was now holding the baby, Aster Anders. "Come on Mom. It's not Kull's fault." Motion snuck in and slipped Aster out of Amy's arms while the argument got really rolling. Danny hugged Taylor.

By the time Glory Girl got back with Theo Anders Taylor was chuckling. As everyone watched the battle progress toward the water she finally asked "What's with surrendering to me specifically."

L33t shrugged "You took down Lung."

Uber added "You were the only one recognizable in a group of new merchants who still had enough sense to run."

Purity shrugged "I've been fighting the ABB for two years. I hate those drug dealing bastards. The cops mostly had the Merchants under control. I broke from the Empire when I divorced Kaiser two years ago. I figured you and your group might be strong enough to keep him from taking Aster from me."

Everyone squatted at another huge explosion and Lisa nervously said "It might not be a problem after tonight."

Just then Taylor, Sarah and Danny's phones went off.

AP

Dragon landed the VTOL in the union yard and followed Armsmaster and Miss Militia out. Danny met them and led them into the cafeteria. Armsmaster set up a projector and got right into the briefing "As you know we all have an enemy not easily gotten to. We feel that now, while he is deployed, we can take his base. We think we can use the Undersiders to get us in."

Lisa drummed her fingers "I don't see how. I mean we four could and should probably report back sometime soon. He will not have deployed."

Taylor nodded "He didn't. he is in contact with his troops and capes from his office. I still have a minimal surveillance presence there."

Uber added "Your powers are complete bullshit. He manipulates timelines. He is probably doing it focused on the battle. If we could get in we could probably take him out. If we try to capture him he will manipulate the timelines until he successfully escapes."

Taylor frowned "So he is in two or more timelines?"

Lisa frowned "No he is in one but seeing and selecting one other that has a favorable outcome. It happens continuously and at the speed of thought. He, his physical body, is just running the actions he took in the successful timeline."

Taylor nodded "So if I poison him in this timeline he is going to stay dead."

Lisa, Uber, and Dragon looked at each other. Amy rolled her eyes and texted Dinah. She got a return text immediately "Ninety nine percent dead."

Taylor nodded "Set up to get in there. I am sending lethals. Have the antivenom ready. Maybe it will save him."

Dragon nodded "Can you do something about his computer? He will have a self-destruct mechanism. Its evil genius 101."

Taylor mumbled "OK then. Uh, Amy you are going to have to steer again, I got a huge swarm going in three places, doing about five thousand different things."

Lisa snorted "So multi-tasking fifteen thousand things is your limit. What kind of world conqueror are you?"

Taylor snapped "One that's still in high school."

Lisa sniffed "Alexander was King by sixteen."

Taylor rolled her eyes "Because his dad died. Mine is going to live forever. Now hush. I am dragging people out of burning buildings all over the place. Turning people back from the water so they don't get hypothermia and moving bombs to areas with no people in them, those poor rats, plus getting some of the girls ready to jump Coil and about a trillion cockroaches to eat his IT infrastructure. Man, there are a lot of roaches near his base. Oh well, handy for us but something will have to be done. It isn't even that bad of a neighborhood."

Around this conversation people were getting ready to move. Dragon watched amazed. Armsmaster was very quiet. She looked at him. In his HUD she put up a message "You OK?"

"Uber, L33t, Purity. Two class S threats and a Alexandria package. High powered thinkers and tinkers." He sent back.

"We can deal with it later Colin. They are suiting up to help. The girl Motion is a ninety-eight percent facial match to Squealer and that armor is steam powered. That is probably the missing Trainwreck, rebranded as Steampunk."

"With a wash, buff out, and paint job."

"Colin did you just make a joke?"

Armsmaster sighed. Dragon chuckled. "The Director is going to freak."

Dragon nodded "No doubt. Brandish can unfreak her, Mr. Hebert will help."

"Christ on a bicycle."

Dragon laughed this time.

AP

Coil was happily running his timelines. Everything was looking good when both timelines cut off. His body, with a distinct lack of input, fell out of his chair.

Taylor and her group, Armsmaster and Dragon slid into the facility with Lisa using her codes to open doors.

New Wave fanned out to search. Armsmaster arrowed to Coils office and Taylor walked down the catwalk in the center atrium being steered by the elbow.

As Taylor got to the office everyone was reporting clear. Armsmaster looked at Taylor "Where is he?"

Taylor looked around surprised. Vicky, with them for fire power as normal, wrinkled her nose "Taylor why are there so many dead bugs here?"

Taylor had come to a stop so she could talk again "No idea, I lost my eyes and ears into here just as we came in. He was down. He didn't go out any doors, but he isn't here. Its like he transported away."

Colin cursed under his breath and Dragon explained "We have had this happen before. Especially to precogs. A woman in a business suit takes them."

Taylor and the girls blinked. Amy asked "A business suit?"

Lisa's voice came over the radios they were using "Guys we have a problem."

Vicky snorted "Just one?"

AP

Contessa looked at the man she had retrieved and put on Doctor Mothers table. He was covered in bites. Or his visible skin was. She put the vial she had acquired in another part of his facility down. Doctor Mother arched a brow at her and she shrugged "Black widow spiders. A lot of them."

Doctor Mother moved to a refrigerated cabinet "Ruthless."

Contessa nodded "Kull. My power doesn't function when it crosses her plans."

Doctor Mother looked at her and then continued starting an IV "I can probably save him. He might lose these hands. That's the drug he was going to use on the precog?"

"Clairvoyant told me it was." Contessa agreed.

Doctor Mother nodded "I'll analyze it for synthesis and then we will see if it works. Thomas could be very useful."

Contessa shrugged "Not around Kull. Obviously, his power doesn't work around her either. Plus, he was in his base alone. Who does that?"

Doctor Mother chortled "He trusted his power too much maybe. It had served him very well up until he got envenomed after all."

Contessa tapped her chin with her arms crossed and one leg spread a bit to the front and side. Like she was looking at a piece of art in a gallery "Maybe that's why our powers don't work around her, hers are working with creatures who are unpowered. She is affecting the world on a different level."

Doctor Mother shrugged "You never had that problem with any other Masters. Plus, while that is her main power it is not her only one."

AP

The group gathered in front of the enormous vault door and watched as Lisa talked to someone on the other side. They listened as Lisa worked the story of Noelle Meinhardt from her, then the story of what she and the Travelers were doing here.

Taylor set up a defense of Coils Bunker while Dragon pillaged his network and Armsmaster worked on disarming his explosives and turning his technology to their use.

After about a half an hour Noelle mentioned she was hungry and asked about the Travelers. Grue got on the radio to try to figure out what happened to them and Taylor directed a stream of roaches into the vault. Lisa had cracked the door open. Noelle didn't want them to see her though so she left it barely cracked.

Lisa listened to the radio and relayed what Marks scouts were telling her about the Travelers who all seemed to be alive. Amy tried to work out from Noelle what Coil had done to help her. After a while Amy huffed "So nothing then. OK, I can at least see if I can do something Noelle."

"I don't want you seeing me." Noelle replied.

Amy rolled her eyes "I'm a teenager, a girl, and I have my own body issues Noelle. I'm not going to talk to anyone about yours. Glory Girl won't either. She is so vain she is out here redoing her makeup so her clones look good."

"Hey!"

Noelle snickered "OK if I am not hungry I might be able to not clone you guys."

Lisa huffed "You and Kull are going to get along fine. She eats constantly too. You will have your own booth at Fugly Bobs."

Amy snorted "I can check and see if is your powers making you hungry Noelle. So how do we do this?"

They heard the resignation in Noelle's voice "I'll close my eyes."

The group looked around at each other and shrugged. Amy and Vicky went into the vault as soon as they pulled the door open far enough. The others listened to the conversation as Amy worked on Noelle.

Grue still on the radio announced "Dawn, the fights breaking up. The combatants are running into the cordon and being foamed. Apparently they are all exhausted. Othala is healing the injured. Kull and Panacea are needed there."

Taylor snorted "A little busy, and we have school."

Brandish spoke up "School is cancelled. I got a text. You all have a villain day."

Laserdream blinked 'That's a thing? I saw that in the rule book. I thought it was bullshit. Somebody having a joke."

Taylor groused "Villain day and I have to work, typical. Lisa what is wrong with you?"

Lisa was silently laughing so hard tears were streaming down her cheeks. She managed "Body sculpting. Noelle is taking the opportunity to get what she always wanted. Amy says it's too skinny to be healthy. She made Vicky strip to show Noelle what healthy is. They want Motion to come in."

Taylor sighed "Females and their issues." Grue slapped Regent in the back of the head preemptively. Shielder knew better and the dads amongst New Wave shook their heads while the moms nodded.

Armsmaster walked up and looked around "What did I miss?"

Lisa listened to the conversation in the vault for a minute and rolled her eyes "Panacea going full on Doctor Superhero. We need a full hazmat suit for Noelle. Amy couldn't turn her power off and if she doesn't concentrate all the time she makes evil clones of people she touches, after she takes them in her body, and it makes her throw up. She thinks, so far it's been mostly animals, she doesn't think people are a problem though. Plus, she grows that weird sort of body thing. Oh, Amy wants her to get counseling too. A psychologist specializing in eating disorders."

Brandish nodded "We know a couple. Or I do. It's always good to have a client in counseling when you go to court. The PRT can pay. After all, she got this way in an Endbringer attack.

Armsmaster blinked "I saw a locker with some suits. He wandered off with Dragon watching him, shaking her head and chuckling.

"Overloaded, defaulted to problem solving mode." Dragon supplied.

Miss Militia announced "I have a squad on the way here to take this over and the parahumans and bangers are all under arrest. We need to get Kull and Panacea to the front lines."

Shielder asked "How are radios working down here in a secured bunker that's above Endbringer shelter class?"

L33t perked up. Miss Militia sighed. "Later. Let's get Noelle dressed and move the healers."

The group moved back up a tunnel to the surface and into the trucks provided. The Dads drove. Taylor, Amy, Lisa, and Vicky talked to Noelle. Dragon watched and smiled. "Taylor's group can integrate anyone."

Brandish snorted "Except for hard core villains, they haven't done that yet. All of these others have a record of minor crimes. Or villain on villain crime. Just enough to drive me crazy with their cases. I may have to bring in help. Most of the Union lawyers are labor, contract, and tax attorneys. They only have one with criminal experience."

The huge moving vans stopped and pop hissed as the airbrakes came on and everyone hopped out of the troop seats Motion had made up and put in the trucks. They looked out onto a battlefield. They got down and Taylor looked around until she found the triage area then led Amy over. Taylor talked to Lady Photon as she worked telling her where people were trapped. She had dropped her sea swarm and most of her land swarm. Lady Photon directed New Wave and their associates rescue and firefighting efforts while she integrated herself with the Police and Fire Chiefs who seemed to be running this part of the operation. Armsmaster found the other Protectorate members with Dragon and Miss Militia and got them, wards and all, integrated into the rescue and apprehension effort.

Taylor and Amy worked on the ones the medics put in the expectant area and healed them enough to live. It was a good system, unless someone was dead when they were found they were saved.

When they were taking a break and eating lunch talking to their new associates some more, including Theo who was dead useful moving stuff with his huge concrete, steel, or stone arms, Bakuda was dug out of the burned pile of rubble she was in and brought to the triage area. Armsmaster took her mask and put a domino mask on her behind held up blankets. The medics stripped her to her underwear and a set of toe rings was removed from her. A trauma doctor evaluated her and called in a neurologist. She was declared brain dead. Her body was running on autonomic functions.

A huge debate ensued before Panacea was even asked if she could take a look at her. Amy lay a hand on Bakudas head and sighed "I can save her. It will probably wipe out most of her past. The temporal lobes are severely damaged. The frontal, parietal and occipital less so but still damaged. For some reason her brain stem and basal ganglia are nearly unharmed. The Corona Pollentia and Gemma are uninjured."

The neurologist winced. "She will have to be reeducated, nearly completely if the damage is heavy. She will be essentially a new person."

Everyone looked at Taylor "Oh hell no. You aren't saddling me with some crazy bomber."

The neurologist shrugged "She will only be as crazy as her reeducation lets her be."

Armsmaster nodded and looked at Amy "Her powers are intact?"

Amy shrugged "They seem to be, at least nothing in her brain indicates they are damaged."

Carol sighed "So a toddler, who can build bombs out of dust and spit."

Dragon nodded "I am pushing this up Guild channels Armsmaster. I think you should push it up the Protectorate chain."

Armsmaster nodded "I think this is above my pay grade."

Noelle looked at Amy "Don't you have to heal her or something, isn't there an oath?"

Amy shrugged "It's something we just started. We have no idea of the efficacy or harm it does. I can leave her, 'First do no harm' lets me have an out until we understand if this works or not. That will take a year or so for the first ones I have done anything to the brains of. We are assuming what will happen based on what we know of the brain and how it works. My power isn't going to force me to heal her, neither is my conscience."

Taylor nodded "The rest of them will live. Some to be prosecuted of course. It is going to take me two weeks to write up everything I saw or sensed. The prosecutions are going to take months. Meanwhile it looks like the organized gangs in Brockton Bay are down for the count."

Danny nodded "Roy will want to keep it that way as will the governor."

Carol shook her head "The prosecutions are going to take years. The investigations will take months."

Sarah looked around at the desolate burn scared landscape "Meanwhile it looks like an Endbringer came to town." Everyone looked up and around then nodded.

Danny clapped his hands together "Lots of work cleaning this up." Taylor laughed and hugged him.

Armsmaster looked at Amy "The triumvirate wants her healed. The Protectorate will pay for her reeducation. If she retains her memories she will be prosecuted."

The neurologist shook his head "I guarantee massive amnesia. We will be lucky if she remembers how to talk and her potty training."

AP

Taylor flopped in a chair in the Arcadia cafeteria four days later, Monday. It was the first day back in school. As it turned out the bangers weren't quite through, or their remnants and associates weren't. The Police, State Police, DEA, ATF and National Guard had gone on a spree rounding them all up and putting them in a camp behind concertina wire five rows wide and five rows tall between two twenty-foot-high chain link fences in the center off the burnt out area with tents and porta potties.

Motion built them a lot of turrets, with fully automatic twelve-gauge shotguns loaded with rubber buckshot. Food was lifted over the fence three times a day. They were left to sort themselves as the investigations proceeded. Unrest was punished with burst of rubber buckshot. Then water cannons. Finally darts of sleeping agents and flying squads with clubs and containment foam. Crimes committed in the holding camp were punished by the perpetrator being placed in a chain link cage six feet on a side with a tin roof over it and a bucket in the corner. Prisoner on prisoner crime was amazingly low. Behavioral scientist were studying it already.

Taylors swarm was used to find suspects or scout locations. They had, with L33t, Motion, and Steampunk's assistance got the Camera Coons equipped, armored and outfitted with simple tools. Amy had increased their brain size and complexity, shut off their breeding, and amped up their connection to Taylor. They were amplifier stations and the centers of swarms for her. She was still the receiver of all the data though and it was exhausting, but getting better as she and the Camera Coons learned. Plus the PRT was receiving the feeds from the Camera Coon's as well. Very little happened in Brockton Bay outside of private homes that a furry little face with a bandit mask didn't see. Motion, of course, adopted the one assigned to the dockyards. Dragon used its camera to test the data security as it slept in her room. If you weren't on a list approved by Taylor you didn't see those feeds. That didn't stop the entire planet from trying to hack into them though. Motion smiled every time Dragon told her the number of attacks on the feed.

Amy rubbed Taylors shoulder "Tired Babe?"

Lucy awed. Amanda batted her lashes. Vicky laughed, then glared at Dean who dropped his head. The other Wards laughed at him then snapped their mouths closed when all the girls in the vicinity glared at them. The girls laughed and high fived. Amy cleared her throat "You didn't answer Babe." Taylor leaned her head onto Amy's shoulder. Amy touched her forehead and got a concerned look "Home and bed for you after school. Law enforcement and the Army can do it the hard way for one night."

Carlos nodded "Before they forget how. Lung and Oni Lee got convicted. Canary was found innocent. Bakuda is awake and has no memory past her first couple of years of school."

Lucy blinked "Aren't you a font of information?"

Carlos shrugged "It will be on the news tonight." He waved his phone which had an official PRT press release. "It's already on PHO."

Vicky nodded "I can't believe we had to write a press release to get them to shut up about us and our part in that crap."

Dennis tossed out "I can't believe nine hundred users got six week bans from TinMother for speculating about who Motion and Steampunk are. That did more to slow down the crazy speculation than anything. Most of the usual nut jobs were on that list."

Chris grinned "And only two of your troll ID's."

Dennis grinned "I made VoidCowboy completely lose his shit in one post. A new record."

Taylor perked up and laughed "You should get that on a T Shirt. Delphi was so pissed. She had the record before. She got him in two. Tattletale wasn't happy either. She had the one before when she got him in three."

Lucy snorted "Credit needs to go to Kull. She primed him. 'stop beating off in your moms basement and go and get some vitamin D' I nearly wet myself laughing. You can just see the little troll sitting down in the basement with a tinfoil hat on."

Taylor smirked "Magnifying glass in one hand, tweezers in the other. I got an infraction though." The guys winced then laughed. The girls just cracked up. While everyone was busy Taylor leaned over and kissed Amy on the cheek "Thanks for that adjustment. Now I can make it through the afternoon."

Lucy sighed and Amanda clasped her hands in front of her chest. Amy rolled her eyes.

As soon as class finished Vicky took Taylor and Amy to Taylor's house. Amy put Taylor to bed. Vicky went to the dockyard to let everyone know what was going on. She glared anyone who disagreed into silence.

AP

Emma Barnes watched as Taylor Hebert, and where had she gotten those boobs and that ass, walked around Weymouth Mall with Glory Girl and Panacea on a Tuesday afternoon like it was nothing at all. It was pretty obvious her and Panacea were into each other. Emma sighed, she could feel the fury building. This was going to set her therapy back months. It was like that bitch therapist had a wireless connection to her fucking brain! Goddamnit!

Panacea saw Emma. She had googled the little cunt. Then Facebook stalked the ever living fuck out of her. There was no way she could get disengaged from Taylor to give the cunt a hunchback though. This was the problem with dating a girl. You couldn't even fake a bathroom trip. Fine. One day she would catch up with Emma fucking Barnes. A hump and club foot would be the least of the wall eyed little sluts problems when she was done with her. Cannibalistic herpes simplex forty three. Amy hugged Taylor's waist tighter and thought about how to go about that as she walked.

AP

Danny brought the, hmmm what were they exactly? New Wave and Associates? Associated Capes Of Brockton Bay, that sounded pretty Union. "Hmm, Hmm OK let's get the first meeting of the Associated Capes of Brockton Bay under way." Everyone looked at him and he shrugged "We need a name to put on the paperwork and its essential done. Well other than you guys voting on the articles of Union and electing a President, Secretary, and Treasurer."

Taylor grinned "BBCU, Brockton Bay Capes Union."

There were some nods around the table and Delphi clinched it when she announced "Because, BBCU bitches." Danny facepalmed, Carol frowned and of course the vote passed on the first ballot. Then Taylor was elected President over her own objections, Lisa was made Secretary and Sarah was elected treasurer. Made sense, she was a fund manager. Rachel blinked when she got made shop steward. Regent opened his mouth and she smacked him in the head. Everyone chuckled. Rachel wasn't afraid to do that to Taylor either. Hence shop steward. Danny knew the other shop stewards would be pleased. They had taken a shine to the girl as she just went about her business and didn't take any shit from anyone.

Danny got the meeting back in order "OK, now Taylor has purchased the scrap metal in Brockton Bay for a hundred thousand dollars. Salvage rights really. She has also purchased the properties around the docks the city has seized for less than that. There are some more if any of you all have some loose capitol. I think it might be a worthwhile investment. See Lisa, she has a development plan. We have a list of jobs for you all to complete. Please see the appropriate foremen for where and when they need you. Purity if you can dial that helix thing sharper somehow you can save us a lot of money and increase profits for everyone by cutting up the ships. Laserdream, all of you blasters, the same. Control will be the name of the game however. Theo if you can get practiced with your hands to lift the ships then the brutes can move the pieces to barges. This could go quick clean and for lots of money. L33t, Motion and Steam, we will need some way to contain them and filter the water around them for pollutants. Uber can help with that. We are starting with one of the medium sized freighters and then we will scale up or down. Everybody will get a chance to test skills and try to develop new ones. Taylor a water swarm capable of marking metals if you can figure it out.

"OK, a lot of people will be watching this. We want a good, clean, quick job. Meanwhile we are going to salvage out the buildings around here that we can't use or that are too far gone to rehab.

"Last but not least, Motion, the ferry. Let's see what it will take to get it up and running. Add wharfs for it at both ends of the boardwalk and the base of the major streets that run down to the bay and some kind of passenger signaling system so the boats know when to stop, and recondition and improve the four boats.

"None of this is on a deadline, so slow and safe is how this is going to go."

Mark nodded "And while we are doing this we are not going to neglect our educations or training, plus, as we now have a lot of public recognition, we are going to patrol. Just because we beat the villains down doesn't mean they are gone or that others won't try to rise up or come in and take over.

"With the addition of Motion, Steampunk, Uber, L33t, Delphi, Purity, Kull, Theo, Tattletale, Grue, Bitch and Regent to the already eight members of New Wave we are the largest Parahuman organization in the region. A heroic organization. We will act like it. Unlike the Protectorate and PRT though we will work with the local authorities and against all crime not just criminal capes.

"For you former villains this will only help your cases. If we can ever get on the docket behind the hundreds of scum ahead of us. The good thing is that gives you time to rehabilitate your images."

Amy chimed in "You have an hour of therapy a week, this is mandatory. Including you Taylor. If you aren't getting eight hours of sleep a night I want to know why. I am not having one of you stumbling around like a zombie."

Vicky interrupted "Taylor." She got a poked-out tongue and some chuckles.

Amy reached over and took Taylor's hand "It was an emergency, we understand, but all of us let it go on to long. Watch out for each other."

Danny looked around "Anything else? I'll hand you over to your new president then."

Taylor smiled at the gavel she was handed "The only thing I want to say is that there are some independent and rogue capes out there. Let's try to get them in the Union. Especially Parian as we have yards of material and a billion limpets and need uniforms and armor. Plus, she can sell those to other Parahumans. We might also be able to get a contract with the BBPD and Protectorate.

"OK I smell the barbeque and Tyrone was cooking, man that big has to cook good right?" She banged the gavel and everyone cheered and laughed.

AP

Emily Piggot looked at the reports and nodded "Union Capes, and it is all legal. So is this company owned by a cape, unbelievably enough. The lawyers have been over the documents with a fine-tooth comb. Hero Services LLC." Emily snorted.

Dragon smiled from the monitor "Improbable as it seems. Maybe Brockton Bay is the place they can succeed. MIRIS certainly appears to think so and are putting all their resources behind the effort."

Emily sighed "So what changed. How did this happen. If they can pull it off fine, but I am cynical enough to try to look for the dark cloud around this silver lining."

Dragon gave a shrug "Taylor Hebert is a kind girl. Who believes given a chance humans will, as a species try to do better. She also believes there are some who are just bad apples. She doesn't mind culling those. She also has a positive effect on those near her for some reason. Maybe an aura like Glory Girl. Plus her power set is complete bullshit. She lacks the aggression of most capes, or channels it somehow. She certainly went all out on Lung. I think her next battle with a parahuman could be telling."

Emily snorted "Kull culling. Nice. You know what's weird, that is the most open secret in the world and no one says a word."

Miss Militia shrugged, she had been quiet for the whole conversation "Would you risk it?"

AP

Shadow Stalker had been given leave to get her stuff from her mom's apartment. While she was home she was going to tie up a lose end. Taylor fucking Hebert. The bitch wasn't hiding in the library, had transferred to Arcadia and didn't hang out at the school sporting events or watching practice, either the male teams or the cheerleaders. Weirdo. Probably had no idea what sex was. Of course she didn't hang out on the boardwalk.

The town was different too. Hardly anything she could sink her teeth into going on. What? Haha! Speak of the devil and up she pops. Going in a bookstore. Fucking geek. Shadow Stalker moved into the bookstore and without hesitation brought up a crossbow and fired. Taylor snatched the bolt out of the air, broke it in one hand, took a step and backhanded Sophia through the plate glass window and onto Lord Street.

Sophia was still dazed when the cops snapped the cuffs on her. The last thing she saw was the shop owner trying to refuse the money Hebert was trying to give him to pay for the window. The last thing she saw without bars between her and it anyway.

If she had looked the other way she would be grateful if she never saw the outside of a cell again, at least in Brockton Bay. Vicky was standing in front of Amy smiling at her "You have it so bad, you tiny little S class threat."

Amy growled then hugged her adopted sister "A year ago you would have killed her yourself."

Vicky nodded "Or smacked her harder than that and had you put her back together. Taylor looked so surprised when Shadow Stalker flew out that window. Wrong time of the month for that bitch to pull that huh?"

Amy gasped and smacked her sister in the arm again "Don't talk about my girlfriend's period, what is wrong with you!"

Vicky grinned "Come on lets feed her a hot fudge sundae before that guy cries."

Amy nodded and walked over taking Taylors arm. Taylor had her phone in the other hand texting one handed. Amy and Vicky settled her and she sighed "A glazier is coming right now Mister Ameddi."

Charlie Ameddi laughed "Fine Miss Hebert. I know it wasn't your fault. It was that thug." He sighed "I hoped we were done with those. It never seems to end though. Always some illiterate trash trying some idiocy. Now you go with Panacea and Glory Girl, oh here take your book. Geometric Topology. I had never even heard of that before."

Taylor smiled "Sometimes I wish I hadn't."

Amy drug her off, she waved over her shoulder. Vicky looked at her "So you OK?"

Taylor nodded "Fucking bitch. Mr Ameddi had a HD camera though. Caught the whole thing. They got her this time. Assault with a deadly weapon. I don't think the cops will release her to the PRT this time. She is going to the holding area with electric bracelets."

Amy shrugged "Even if they do she is going back to Biloxi. Capes aren't doing well there right now."

Taylor groaned "Dad is going to flip his shit. I am not in the mood. I need chocolate."

Vicky smiled "Or hot fudge." Taylor moaned and the girls towed her away.

Danny heard what happened and called Roy, who called the police chief, who called Director Piggot. It was a spreading wave of discontent. Armsmaster collected Shadow Stalker, put a different set of cuffs and a hood on her, and she was in PRT Houston before midnight. In a cell.

AP

Armsmaster was getting a bit grouchy. Thankfully it was Legend on the other side of the video conference "She is a useless gutter snipe who was forced on the wards. She can go insubstantial and shoot arrows, whoop de fucking doo. She has tried to kill Taylor Hebert for near two and a half years. Taylor has been triggered three or four months and her first used sanitary napkin after her trigger is more useful than Sophia fucking Hess."

Legend blinked then howled with laughter. Armsmaster pouted. Dragon had to cover her mouth for a minute. Legend finally got control "But how do you really feel Colin? Can we get that pad in the wards? Should I send Alexandria?"

Dragon broke up laughing and had to walk away from the camera. You could still hear her howling though. Armsmaster's pout was epic. Finally, Legend managed to get serious and Dragon reappeared though she was smiling. Colin said "That is the last Ward I take who fails my and Miss Militia's evaluation, one of the PRT Director's recommendation or not."

Legend nodded "Yes we have seen the paperwork. Meanwhile Shadow Stalker is going to guard a quarantine zone. I hear Gary is nice in the spring. Whatever the judge sentences her to will be served there. When she isn't on the wall she will be in a cell If she survives, we will see what we do then. I'll be visiting to talk to Mr. Hebert about this tomorrow. I have an appointment at four at his office. I'm dying to meet his assistant. She sounded very upbeat."

Dragon groaned "Tattletale. Oh, my gods, what will they do next?" The video conference went on for a while.

AP

At six pm in a large conference room of the Union Hall dinner was being served family style to the BBCU. The president, Taylor, had decided getting everyone together once a day would be good until they got up and running. The food was good so no one was concerned about that. It was made from scratch with high quality fresh ingredients straight off the docks or the railhead so there was no way to get fresher in Brockton Bay. Most important of all the Moms didn't have to cook after a long day at work, As Mark was working as the training side of Operations and Training he was working a full day now too, so he wasn't bitching. A DWU security patrol went out for the hour they had scheduled for dinner. With the knowledge and consent of the City and State government. Mark ran those like Marine Recon or Army Scout Platoons. They observed and reported, they could and would defend themselves and civilians though. It had turned into wins all the way around.

Taylor looked at the folder Lisa had given her "Ten thousand tons? Theo are you OK?"

Theo nodded smiling "It was easy. I can do much much more. I can lift them one end at a time and Jesse in environmental control and his crew can slip a giant bag made out of Tyvek over them, well, with a crane and some tractors. Then once its bagged they can either float it to the dry docks here or cut it up in the bag."

Kayden nodded "I cut that one up in a couple hours between appointments today. It was fun!"

Lisa nodded "Then we are left with a bag full of waste water we can run through a separator plant Steam and Uber built and the fuel oil runs a generator Motion made that is as big as a house. You have to see this thing!"

Motion nodded "A hundred megawatts. It's pretty sweet. I did a little work on it and the generator and got them up to that. Beauty being it can supply all the heat and electricity we need and it burns what is really a waste product that would have to be disposed of or refined again. I even got it to meet emission standard's. That took a little thought and some tinkering. I put one of my audio emitters in the building in canceling mode. Its running right now, we are selling power back to the city at a ferocious rate as we can't use even a fifth of its capacity and it runs better fully loaded. We should get about ten grand a day from Brockton Bay Light, Gas and Water. The cooling water is used to heat the fuel tanks the oil is stored in when its returned from the heating customers. If we have excess we can run a steam distillation plant for fresh water I am working on. L33t designed some insulation so we hardly lose anything, I even wrapped the exhaust manifold in water pipe then we insulated them. We make so much heat!"

Taylor smiled and nodded. It was good to see her people happy and productive. Now she knew how Dad felt when he got a big contract. She looked at Danny and her smile grew. He smiled back and nodded.

Carol piped up "Well our next union member will be Canary apparently. We managed to get her off and fight off the civil suit so she is free and clear."

Uber nodded "Maybe something like an auto tuner to cut out her power. Then she could keep singing if we could get a couple of tinkers to certify it. L33t lit up and started doodling on a napkin. Motion made a few corrections as he worked. Steampunk watched and nodded.

Danny asked "Perhaps we should ask her if she wants to join first?" He held his hands up when everyone just looked at him then grinned "Guess not, because, BBCU bitches!" He did the finger snap thing and everything everyone laughed. Delphi, Dinah, looked smug. Her mother facepalmed.

Taylor whined "Daaad!"

Brian spoke up "My sister triggered. She is a high stranger. We lost her for three days." Brian stilled the immediate shouting about who triggered her "She got caught in the crossfire between a bunch of bangers. She is fine and thinks it's cool. Everyone meet Imp." A girl about Dinah's age appeared. Everyone blinked and laughed.

Imp nodded "Because, BBCU bitches!" Brian facepalmed while everyone laughed.

Carol continued "Good news for you too Bitch. The PRT concluded their investigation, arrested their detective and offered a million dollars in compensation. He is rolling over on the City detective who has a bad history and you can expect the same from the city's insurance company."

As everyone sat contemplating that Danny asked "Any chance to squeeze them?"

Carol shook her head "There is precedent. It's not that unusual. Neither is the payment. Sadly."

Rachel looked at Taylor. Taylor looked at Carol, then Danny, then gave Rachel a nod. Rachel said "OK."

Amy bristled "Mom can't we get better from them! They hurt Rachel for years!"

Carol sighed "It's pretty set Amy. If we go after them they could go the other way, down not up."

Danny drummed his fingers "I'll see if I can't get a concession. They pay for a therapist maybe. Oh, and whatever tutors Rachel needs to get her GED. Yes, that I can see. It would save Rachel thirty or forty grand for a good tutor."

Carol nodded "That should wrap up fairly quickly, with that concession even. They are pretty busy and want to get everything they can off their plate."

Sarah nodded "Parian wants to look at your materials Taylor. Kayden how did daycare work out for Aster?"

Kayden smiled "Those ladies are great and Aster loves them. You should have seen the face she made when I took her away from Miss Jem."

Danny laughed "Tyrone says you should see his moms face when she rides to work. She can't wait to see Aster."

Taylor nodded "So, patrol schedules?"

Mark passed them out. Everyone concentrated while reading them. They included routes check in points and withdrawal criteria. Lisa reviewed the camera coon's footage and developed a trends document that Mark used to set up the patrols. Dinah's numbers were posted at the reference points so everyone knew when they could expect trouble.

Taylor looked around as everyone finished reading and asked "Questions? No? OK vote on Canary?" It was unanimous. "Imp?" Another unanimous vote. "OK. Imp come see me please. We need to talk about rules, education, and training."

Imp blinked "School! Oh man!" Brian laughed.

The meeting broke up and Lisa walked up to Amy "Amy? What's going on? You were furious over Rachels settlement."

"Taylor loves Rachel and someone abused her." Amy growled. She squawked when Rachel hugged her from behind, then walked off without a word.

Lisa looked at her "I hope you know what you are doing mom."

Amy blushed.

Taylor finished laying down the law to Aisha or Imp, she looked over at Theo, He had the early patrol with Crystal and Eric. He looked pensive. "Theo?"

He looked up "Taylor."

"Something wrong Theo?"

"I can't think of a cape name."

Taylor smirked "Want to piss your dad off? Look at Jewish history. a prophet, oh, a Rabbi! One of those should light Kaiser right up." Theo laughed

AP

The girls got up in the morning, they were at the Dallon's for last night and this morning. They exercised with Mark, dragging Carol along and then got off to school. A perfectly normal day. Taylor was so glad.

Dean and the wards looked at them funny as they sighed and relaxed. Dennis opened his mouth but Lucy beat him to talking "It's a good time for a normal day."

The guys looked at each other as the girls got deep into how good it really was. Carlos finally shook his head and led them away. The girls snickered. Vicky sighed "It's so fun keeping them confused. At some point I am going to want to date one seriously though." The conversation swung onto serious topics, the merits of a boy worth dating.

AP

Flechete stepped into the wards day room and looked around. Pretty standard. Too bad about Shadow Stalker. She was about the right age to hang out with. Who knew she was a criminal? OK, no time for wool gathering, she had a familiarization patrol this afternoon with Miss Militia and then the Wards to meet.

An hour later Flechete was in open mouthed awe of the burned over desolate war zone with the prison camp in it and Miss Militia's recount of the events. Getting there they had driven through a war zone of weird bomb aftermaths. Miss Militia looked at her and sighed "You feel like you came to a war zone."

Flechete nodded "A bit. And this all started when a new cape appeared and turned out to be a Triumvirate level power hitter?"

Miss Militia shook her head "That was the explosion. The foundations of this were laid nearly when the first parahumans appeared. We'll cover it in your class on assessment and evaluation. Some mistakes were made. They can be learned from.

"Some advice, Kull is a really nice girl, right up until you threaten her family or friends. Things get a bit out of control then."

Flechete looked around thinking 'yeah, a bit.' The windshield tour of the battlefield that was Brockton Bay continued. It was odd seeing the places that had been mentioned so horrifically on PHO. Especially on a fine day in the spring. A couple of those places still had people stuck inside domes of bomb effects. Bakuda's reeducation was going to have to happen before they could reverse some of them.

AP

The girls bounced into the yard and got their job list. They were just getting started when Legend flew in and landed. Danny met him and the two went in the office. Taylor and Amy looked at Vicky and smiled. Amy asked "You do know he is gay."

Vicky sighed "I could turn him back?" Then she blushed and clapped her hands over her mouth. Taylor and Amy broke up laughing.

Finally getting control of themselves Taylor said "Silk ranching and limpet farming."

Amy nodded "I'll be at the clinic."

Vicky smiled "I get to punch things!"

Taylor smiled "Does that count as therapy for you? I mean, taking out your aggressions on some poor building."

Vicky shook her head, blond hair flying "No, but its so good!" She flew off searching for the crew she was working with. They had a van with coveralls and PPE. Amy giggled, Kissed Taylor and headed for her clinic.

Taylor walked to the huge warehouse she had the widows weaving in. She had them making plain weave cloth in yard wide widths. It was all grey when they finished. These were all second-generation spiders she and Amy had worked on. Their dragline was triple the strength of natural widow's silk. Other bugs were responsible for feeding them, or herding prey to them rather and then rounding up the babies as they hatched and getting them into matchboxes where they lived out their eight to nine month as projected lives. The ones that lay the strongest silk were then bred, or would be and the cycle would start again. She and Amy were hoping to see at least some incremental natural improvement.

Amy was also looking at gene splicing cows for the silk proteins. There was a chemist in the union that was salivating and making all sorts of claims.

The process was running smoothly and the HVAC crew had the building at the perfect temperature and humidity. Taylor turned around and nearly screamed at the porcelain mask she saw first, the golden curls and the dress gave the impression of a doll "Sorry! You caught me unaware. I was checking my processes."

Parian looked at, felt of and then closely examined the cloth. "This is amazing! Does it only come this color?"

Taylor smiled "It depends on what the girls are eating but light grey to brown when woven. The yarn can be single drag line, which is what you are holding, up to almost any number of multiple drag lines spun into yarn then woven. Over here is some six line yarn outer shell material. I don't like to die or heat it so have been using a cold lamination process. I sew through the layers with a machine with dul vibrating needles to keep from damaging the thread."

Parian nodded, her eyes gleaming even behind the mask "And so you understand the material and technologies. What do you need me for?"

Taylor shrugged "Design and manufacture? We think we can charge about five thousand dollars for a really good set of armor, knife, bullet and fire proof, then if we add plates, I'll show you where and how we make those, impact and really large caliber proof and maybe a thousand dollars more."

Parian nodded "Yes this could be very wonderful. I saw this building is tall?"

Taylor nodded "The top floor is open. It's hard to get the temperature and humidity stable so we don't use it. It would be your work area."

Parian nodded "And besides the armor? Can I die some of your silk? Can we try different weaves? Can I make my things?"

Taylor laughed "When you aren't making armor and we have extra silk feel free. We will have to figure out a cost for it. You can tell me what weave you want and I can get the girls to do it. Come on I'll show you how we make the plates."

Taylor led out and around and while Parian watched from the dock she climbed down onto a shallow stone floored area where millions of limpets were depositing the material their teeth was made from onto plastic forms. Taylor pulled up one that was finished. And handed it up. Parian took it and examined it for a moment then hoisted her skirt and put it on her thigh. Taylor nodded "For Delphi. She is close to your size."

Parian removed the plate, dropped her skirt and looked at Taylor "New Wave, so I must tell people who I am?"

Taylor shrugged "Only if you want to. Mark, Mr Dallon, Flashbang, convinced the others that should be voluntary."

Parian nodded "And I have to live here?"

Taylor could hear the wrinkled nose, she laughed "If you don't have a secure place there are rooms, but you don't have too. Our tinkers will want to look at your place and our IT wire the devices they make and install into our system. We don't plan on being caught flatfooted now that we don't know where the threats are coming from. Between my swarms, our tinker tech, and our paranoid head of security we hope to beat the odds."

Parian nodded then cocked her head "Why?"

Taylor shrugged "I am from here. My mother is buried here, my girlfriend is from here. My father is from here. Plus, it can be a good place. It was once. It can be again."

Parian nodded "Can I see my loft?" Taylor smiled and checked the rest of the pieces touching the limpets and making sure they were doing all right and had some 'programming' to keep working. She climbed the steps and Parian looked at her feet and legs, they were armored "Changer then."

Taylor rolled her eyes "Among other things."

AP

Dannny nodded and then smiled "I think that is a fine plan actually. It couldn't happen to a more deserving young woman."

Legend nodded "Armsmaster got rather colorful describing her. Something he never does. He seems to have a high opinion of your daughter."

Danny smiled "Well, we do have something in common then." Legend laughed. Danny asked "Want to look around? I need to be out being seen anyway."

Legend nodded "I would like that. It will be interesting to see a parahuman owned business doing well."

Danny chuckled "It's looking like. You will need to come back in six months once we start turning scrap into money and getting all the product lines up and running. Though with three tinkers that may be a forlorn hope."

Legend nodded "Tinkers must tinker."

"Thank god two of ours use salvaged parts and equipment so effectively." They stopped just outside the double doors and watched a silent, enormous, bulldozer drive into the bay. A buoy on top of the machine belching black smoke floated from its cab roof. Danny dead panned "I have no idea." As the steam powered armor clomped into the bay behind it. Legend laughed, a good hard cleansing laugh.

AP

Parian was twirling in the enormous open area with her skirt up to her knees humming to herself with Taylor watching from a window ledge when Danny and Legend arrived. Legend smiled. Danny asked, "So another union member then?"

Parian spun to a stop "Because, BBCU bit erh." She looked at Legend.

Taylor laughed "She'll get there in no time."

Legend laughed "Can I join?"

Taylor was feeling a bit puckish "Well I don't know. Do you have any special skills?"

Parian nearly swallowed her tongue. Legend looked thoughtful "I'm really good with laser beams."

Taylor nodded "Plus, you know, eye candy. Come on we will find you a boat to cut up so we can see how good you are."

Danny followed along bemused. Legend followed Taylor smiling and Parian, well she had to see this. They got on a workboat and were soon out by one of the prepped smaller ships. Kurt, the ship breaker foreman, played along like it happened everyday "Yeah, well, lets see you cut this thing into five foot sections without puncturing the Tyvek bag. Oh here, in this section follow the markings. We are trying to save the engines and some of the machinery."

Legend looked interested then he took off. Kurt got all the guys on the barge and picked up a megaphone after he got accountability "All clear!"

Legend worked slowly on the first piece but in fifteen minutes had the ship in a stack of slices. Kurt picked up his megaphone "You're hired. Report into the office to get your union card."

Legend landed smiling. All the workers congratulated him. He beamed all the way back to the office and blinked when he got handed a union card with a publicity photo from the internet on it. He was BBCU member number twenty. The administrator behind the counter told him "Your dues will come out of todays check."

Legend blinked "Arthur will love this. Alexandria is going to flip her shit."

The crowd, standing around with phones out laughed. Legend groaned. Taylor was being held up by her father. She was dying laughing. She finally recovered enough to say "Union meeting at six, family welcome. We normally have a family style dinner then, kind of a working dinner. Happy for you to come."

Legend got a gleam in his eye "You know what, let me call Arthur."

AP

The PHO exploded. Literally. The server farm it was hosted on blew the power bus and had to go to backup power. One user, 1Recon, posted a picture, a close up of Legends union card. No words just the picture.

Emily Piggot got a phone call from PRT intel. She put her face in her hands with her elbows on her desk "I wish I could drink."

AP

Arthur arched a brow at him as he bundled Keith up for the flight "You know you are going to have to pay for this. Rebecca has nearly lit the phone network on fire."

John, Legend, smiled "I know."

Arthur sighed "You are enjoying this entirely to much."

John laughed "Because, BBCU bitches!"

Arthur pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment "Fine, let's go Mr. Comedian. I want to meet Taylor. She is obviously a good influence on you. I mean you know her for what, five minutes, and you are going up the nose of the fascist state."

AP

The leaders of Cauldron sat around a table. Contessa shrugged "He is having fun."

David said thoughtfully "This Kull is a powerful master."

Rebecca rolled her eyes. "He is just doing this to piss me off. He isn't mastered. Like a cape that has been triggered a few months could. Plus, every second is being posted on PHO. He found a bunch of working class people and he is living one of his dreams. There is actually great PR going on here now that I think about it. I will have to congratulate him."

Doctor Mother snorted "Who is trying to piss off who now. Come along Contessa. Let's see what Mr Calvert has dreamed today. Play nice children."

AP

Legend and Arthur were having a great time. Taylor didn't mind them there at all and talked about all the ongoing projects then got around to voting. Purity and Parian were in unanimously then Arthur laughed as they put Legend through some paces before voting him in. John, Legend, sat shocked. Even more so when Sarah handed him check with his Union dues itemized as a deduction. Arthur snatched it "Thank you. I've had my eye on an ivory silk rug."

John spluttered "We have a toddler!" The married people in the room cracked up.

Arthur turned to Kayden who was sitting beside him "I must say you aren't what I expected Purity."

Kayden smiled "Kayden. All that goose stepping got tiresome, plus I have Aster now. Kaiser mainly used it as a front to draw in cannon fodder. I was never a believer really. Kaiser is very smooth though."

Arthur nodded "I knew some of those before I met John. I know what you mean about having a child too."

Kayden smirked "The Union has day care."

Arthur nodded then caught himself. The moms chuckled. He sighed "I wonder, do they need an architect."

Danny perked up "You know we could send some work your way. Let me get some details. Nothing time critical, something to work on as you can."

John leaned over to Taylor "Are they a competing union?"

Taylor shook her head "Our parent Union. We are associates of the DWU."

John nodded and turned to Sherrel "And you young lady, I see you survived drowning your bulldozer."

Sherrel laughed "That was a test. The harbor needs dredged. The sonar profile we have says there is a silt damn at the head of the bay and if we clear it the tides will take care of a lot of the harbor. It's a tidal bore see, something, probably one of the older wrecks, got across the entrance years ago, maybe a hundred, and the bay has slowly silted up. I sealed up that dozers internals, strengthened the cab and glass and made that buoy that takes the exhaust to the surface and fresh air down to the intake and fresh air vents for the cab via teleportation."

John blinked "What is the range on that and what is the biggest we could make it?"

Sherrel frowned then nodded "For Endbringers. Yeah, let me work on that with my colleagues. It's going to be a power hog scaled up and made safe for humans."

John nodded "Work out the cost too. We will license the design from you and Dragon can make them. We can put them at the PRT or Protectorate bases. Power won't be an object then."

Arthur talked to Kayden about the daycare some more. He would need to make some trips to look at the site. Kayden shrugged "Have John drop you. If he can't pick you up one of us, or a couple of us can fly you home. Or if he isn't available call us, we will pick you and Keith up. Contrary to what you might think the Docks are the safest part of the city right now."

Arthur looked at Taylor "I watched it on PHO, I can believe it. She really doesn't seem the type."

Kayden nodded "Don't cross her or her girlfriend. She will go full Kull, and Panacea, well if she can heal anything, couldn't she do anything?"

Arthur nodded "As I told John, back when Panacea was so depressed."

Kayden shrugged "Taylor is good for people. Even in the short time I've been around her I see that. I am a heavy hitter so was never afraid of her, but she is just a good person."


	4. Chapter 4

AP 4

"Powers are bullshit." Taylor scowled fiercely.

Vicky snorted and Amy snickered. She looked at Taylors list. The list contained all the powers they could figure out she had, then a short description of them, an attempt at categorizing them, and a rating of them.

Mover, hurdle mover. Brute, muscle, armor, intensity, dynamic. Breaker, related to changer. Master, mental capacity restricted to non-sentient, tool users allowed (trip to zoo required). Tinker, biological focus, possibly what is driving everything aside from Master. Blaster, stinger projection (requires more work to define capability, increase ability. Thinker, combat, environment, skill. Striker, Kull state, 'nough said, oh biokinesis for fun, maybe. Changer, see above. Trump, one, two and nine, or infinity. Stranger, related to affects from swarms.

Amy noticed a trend "You know, you should count those reflexes and that power together and it gives mover five at least. All of this is a cascade of your Master, Brute and Thinker. Well except for that bullshit fourth dimension stuff. That is pure Shaker."

Vicky nodded "And increasing with every one of those math and physics books. You should tutor Vista. You could turn her into a Shaker ten plus in weeks."

Taylor perked up "I'll talk to John next time he stops by to blow off steam."

Amy smirked "Better known as imagining he is chopping up Alexandria or Eidolon. Golem can hardly keep up with him. The environmental crew is in a panic to recycle bags."

Taylor giggled "Golem. I so want to see Kaisers face."

Vicky nodded "Kayden smiles every time she says it. I think she forgot his name is Theo." They all laughed.

Taylor recovered and looked at her chart on her tablet "I think part of the problem is using the PRT's classifications. They are all oriented at target identification and risk mitigation for combat. They aren't truly descriptive." The other two girls blinked.

Vicky shook her head "Tired now, where are we sleeping?"

"Let's just get a room here. We can call the parents." Amy wheedled.

Taylor smiled "Or just tell Dad. He is still in his office. I can send him home at the same time."

The girls had a room in minutes and had it arranged to their liking shortly after that. Vicky took a double bed. Taylor and Amy a queen size. They were asleep in minutes.

AP

Taylor woke in the night with her camisole pushed up around her neck and Amy latched on a lactating breast. She groaned and settled, fiercely enjoying Amy nursing from her. She drifted back to sleep holding Amy to her breast. Her last thought was, 'no wonder I am so hungry all the time'.

Vicky had stilled when she saw Taylors eyes open. When she heard her breathing slow and even out she returned to stroking her clit with one hand and working two long, talented, fingers into herself and onto her G spot with the other. She told herself again 'I'm not gay, that is just the sexiest thing in the world' she then sighed and admitted 'I might be a little gay for Taylor'.

Amy woke up in the morning with her camisole pushed up and Taylor nursing from her. She flexed her hips against the long firm thigh between her legs. Taylor's eyes met hers and she laved her nipple. Amy blinked and grunted. As she recovered she noticed Taylor wiping the milk from her mouth then licking her breast clean "Did you make me lactate?"

Taylor nodded "I got the idea from you. I woke up with you nursing from me. Breast are so cool!"

"I was not nursing from you." Amy declared "Not that it isn't a good idea and now I will be but-" she trailed off looking at the sparkling eyes of Vicky.

Vicky shrugged "About two weeks now. It is the sexiest thing I have ever seen. You two are going to turn me gay. I'm going to have to jump Lucy and Amanda."

"Or you know, two girls right here." Amy blushed and covered her mouth.

Vicky laughed "Once you two figure out what you are, I might jump in. I'm sure my S class threat adopted sister would love to get all kinky and give me to her wife for her birthday, or anniversary."

Taylor looked at Amy and rolled around on the bed laughing at her fish out of water impression.

The door opened and Lisa, Rachel and Sherrel walked in. Sherrel smiled then frowned "We missed the slumber party girls."

Rachel pouted "Not invited." The others stared at her. She smiled. They gaped, she grinned and pumped her fist. She got mobbed and fought her way free of the pile.

As the girls got ready for exercise Lisa slyly asked, "So was it good?"

Amy grinned "Very. Something did come up though. I have apparently been doing things to Taylor in my sleep. Now I need to check her and see what I have done."

The others froze a moment and Lisa nodded "I got such an image before my power kicked in. Fuck Taylor you are so fucking hot! So Amy, you have had all kinds of ideas for making her invulnerable and 'better'. You're afraid without the restraint of your conscious mind you have done all of them. You think that's why Taylor eats like Tyrone should."

Amy nodded "Hey, first get your own! That and the nursing from her."

"Hey! TMI!" Taylor objected. The women all laughed. She huffed "Fine, you can have your way with me after exercise."

Lisa popped up "Come on, training warehouse, then we can play with Taylor! Yay!"

"Oh god what have I done?" Taylor got pushed out of bed and made to dress.

AP

Lisa watched Taylor while they exercised and nodded. "Definitely augmented, muscle, bone, internal organs, senses. She has Glory Girl at a standstill and neither are holding back."

Amy sighed "Stupid subconscious. Stupid love." Lisa grinned. Sherrel rolled her eyes. Rachel hugged her. Amy growled and chased a smirking Rachel up a rope that ascended to the fourth floor through a series of holes in the floor.

Lisa nodded "Taylor isn't the only one."

Sherrel nodded "Yeah, suddenly Rachel has 'feelings'. A few more years and she will be as fucked up as the rest of us girls."

Lisa frowned "That's the therapy don't you think? Wait."

Sherrel smiled and snickered.

AP

Taylor lay on the bed, Amy had a hand on her chest and was moving the other around and reading off things that were different about Taylor. Lisa was writing a list. "So, you have improved me to the maximum a biological can be without changing my shape. The shape changing is me growing and exercising."

"And some sex god loving you, or us, I'm not sure." Lisa smirked. Taylor was all lean cut muscle, miles of legs, well-turned hips, a tight round butt and a full eight pack of abs even at rest. She had a long body as well so didn't need a rib removed, and that ribcage had two spectacular just turned up B headed to C cup, firm, breast. Her back was thickly muscled in a way Olympic athletes would envy and fashion photographers would turn back straight for. She had already been laid on her stomach and ogled in tiny panties and bra and now was giving the show laying on her back.

Amy nodded "That is what it seems like. There might be some more gains to be made in efficiencies. I'm sure, now that I am consciously seeing this, my greedy, jealous, subconscious will work on those next. Sorry."

"No sweat Babe. Come on, switch, let's see if I love you that much." Taylor smiled. Amy arched a brow and held her down to finish.

Lisa smirked at the list "I think you love her as much but I think you need to work on biology, anatomy, and medicine. I don't think you understand it as well as Amy does. Double the capability she had before though. Good job Taylor. Now this afternoon you can do me Amy. Bring me up to five times now, Taylor can watch, then we will wait and see if we want to take me off the charts like Taylor." Amy blinked. Lisa rolled her eyes "Normal girl, powered brain, need the help."

The other girls nodded.

AP

At the meeting that night, after some discussion with Amy, Taylor announced "We will be doing physical upgrades to any who want it."

The room stilled, then Mark asked, "What's possible?"

"We think, first of all, we should only do those people who have stopped growing, at least in the maximum upgrade. After that we can take you up to the maximum theoretical limit of biological possibility. Over several sessions, at the cost of you eating like, uh, well, Taylor does Dad." Amy supplied.

Taylor rolled her eyes "Hey!"

Amy grinned at her "It looks good on you sweety, rowwrrr."

Kayden snorted "Get a room you two. Fine I'll try it."

Aisha put her hand up like she was in school "And the cool kids?"

Taylor nodded "We can do some upgrades but we have to check them every couple of months and make sure they take and grow with you. Once you stop growing at about twenty-two or so we can max you out."

Aisha nodded "As long as you don't screw up the sexy beast I got going on." Brian tapped her on the shoulder and glared at her when she turned to him "What, anybody tries smashing me and they end up frenching a telephone pole when I stranger danger them." Brian facepalmed. Laserdream arched a brow. Sarah was sitting right there ready to Photon Mom though, so she didn't say anything.

Sarah nodded "I'll take the upgrade, the full upgrade. I can see how this would make the kids safer, so we'll look at what we can do for them."

Taylor smiled as the adults all nodded "You too Dad. We can work some things for you. Arthur as well."

Danny nodded "Let's test on me first. All we don't need is to do some harm to Arthur and have John come in here and light us all on fire. We might get some volunteers from the members as well. A lot of those jobs are dangerous as hell."

AP

Dragon and Armsmaster were working on their Endbringer tracking system. Dragon asked, "So how long do you think it will be before Panacea realizes she can upgrade her girlfriend to near Alexandria class invulnerability?" Armsmaster pounded his forehead lightly on the work bench while Dragon snickered.

AP

Principle Jones nodded then lowered the boom "In school suspension for the rest of the year. I told you people no bullying, and no gang stuff. No, it doesn't matter if you are black and the ones you are picking on are the white kids." He looked at the kid with his had raised "Or Asian." The hand went down.

AP

Arthur looked at John "Tough day?"

John sighed "Rebecca. You would think the Union was recruiting in the Wards."

Arthur shrugged "Aren't they? Unintentionally I'm sure, but a job for a cape, training, full medical, union scale wages. No combat unless they want that track. The President is a lesbian or at least bi. The Treasurer is a heterosexual mom of teenagers, a boy and a girl, both of whom are powered and Heroes. The Secretary is whatever Lisa is, asexual I think. Her power is seriously bullshit when it comes to relationships I bet, poor thing, could you imagine? Knowing exactly how broken your partner is. Hopefully love does conquer all or she is going to be alone a long time. Anyway, what parent would turn that down versus what the Wards offer?"

John sighed "Whose side are you on?"

"Don't pout, you'll get wrinkles. Yours John, but she has a point. If they put up a hiring notice they will be swamped, potentially with wards." Arthur gave him a one-armed hug. "As it is they are getting and vetting volunteers. This Faultline and her crew were in last Thursday, talking to Lisa. You should stop by for some work and talk to Taylor. We need a new set of sheets, Oh two days! We can get Keith a new bed. I saw a bed shaped like that crazy bulldozer of Sherrel's that he loves, I probably shouldn't have let him ride around with her while she was moving those warehouses Vicky and her crew knocked down. But you know, boy, and big, loud, yellow, lots of black smoke. Plus, riding around on Aunty Sherrel's lap. The boy is in lurve."

John laughed a bit helplessly "Are we moving to Brockton Bay?" The commute isn't bad for me, well, not once I get above mach one."

Arthur snorted "And you have a towel and dry uniform. Oh Parian texted. She figured out the laminate so your new costume will be ready Monday. She has an assembly line running off PRT ones in standard sizes. The Troopers have to see one of her techs for a fitting though. She did say something about a package and a Technician or two to travel to the other Directorates but the PRT would need to pay travel cost.

"She wants to see the Wards and what the PR people have decided. That will be a fight, you know artistic types, there are bound to be conflicts, whoever is in charge of that should be high up in the Protectorate, or PRT and fully briefed. We don't want to alienate the best and cheapest armor making team in the world.

"And a comb, maybe a blow-dryer. Maybe a weekend place? Oh, in one of these condo buildings I am doing for Taylor. Second row back from the beach, far enough not to have frying tourist in our face. Plus the shopping will be in the first four stories to get the condos elevated enough for great views. Well offices for rent as well. They are going to be spectacular if I do say so myself. Lots of space, airy, great views, even from the back rows. She let me have the room to do that. The child is brilliant."

John got up "Red or white?"

Arthur laughed "White please. Oh no hard liquor, we have the opera later. Carmen."

AP

Deep in a shelter, one not listed in Coils records, a computer counted down further. It had one job and a self-destruct.

AP

Taylor got the meeting underway the next night "OK, so let's lay out the projects we have working and what we intend to work on. I don't want to let something slip."

Lisa nodded and brought up a projection "This is what I know of, side projects you are doing for fun are not listed. We can add then and prioritize them as well if you need help. They are listed in order of priority.

They all looked at the projection. Personnel upgrades, Power development, Training, Patrol, Dog training and shelter operations. Bay and Dockyard salvage, Railyard refurbishment and refrigerated storage building construction/reconditioning, Uniform construction and fitting, uniform sales to PRT.

Lisa ate some more while everyone read and thought then offered "These are the overarching projects. If you look on your tablets the jobs attached to each are listed, in their thousands."

Danny nodded "It's the same for the DWU. We need to think about, and work through, recruiting."

Carol nodded "Which is going to pitch the protectorate and PRT into a tailspin. No Heroic groups recruit. It's all word of mouth."

Brian shrugged "Which might work in this case, just let it be known we are hiring."

"It probably would, let's try that first. Carol and the legal department will need to vet candidates." Danny agreed.

Rachel spoke up "Brain Cat Queen."

Taylor looked at her for a minute then nodded "Probably two, or three, at least to start. They can then control the cat population. We already have the Smart dogs out bringing in strays. If you can make a Queen, Alpha dog combo work together they can work pest control. I'll get with you tonight Rachel."

Amy nodded "I want to come too. We can probably amp them up to be near indestructible. And limit the breeding so they would spread slowly."

Taylor nodded "Not like the crabs. Although, those things apparently lay eggs continuously. That might not have been our fault, and smarter babies' dodge predators better. There are thousands of them out there, even past the continental shelf, All the way down to the Delaware Bay and up to the Bay of Fundy. Boy wasn't that a headache until they all got synched up and their extra capacity got used for processing. Little buggers crawling over seamounts all the way to the mid-Atlantic ridge. Who knew crabs could cover so much ground?" She looked around at the bemused faces and blushed. "Sorry."

Amy nodded "Exactly. I don't want to be fixing any more headaches for you."

Parian spoke up, "I'll come as well. We will need vest for the queens so people will realize they are working animals and not call us about them. That worked well on the Smart dogs. People get a kick out of them having Union member numbers too."

Rachel nodded "Start with a C instead of a D."

Parian smiled under her domino mask "Of course Bitch." Rachel nodded and went back to eating.

Brian sighed "No rest for the weary."

Alec nodded "You said it brother, eight hours a day, even in shallow water, gets tiresome. And if my damn umbilical doesn't stop curling itself up! I swear the thing is trying to kill me."

L33t frowned "What happened to the infinite air bottles?"

Alec shrugged "Communications, so might as well use air. We have the IAB for reserves. Steam, those under water tractors are great though. Dragging those bags to the fully submerged wrecks is a pain in the ass. The tractors make it easy. Taylor your crabs don't miss much. How do they do that?"

Taylor smiled "They can taste the metal oxides in the water. I just send the buoy crabs to the source of the taste. Then they pop a buoy and drag line out, attach the dragline to the source of the taste and keep on doing their thing."

Alec nodded "They find the old wood ones and everything. You wouldn't think those were worth much but low background iron and steel is worth a lot of money. Once we soak the salt out of the wood the carpenters want to try milling it and selling it. Antique wood, who knew? So we bag them up. That stitcher Steam built closes the bag and we pump them full of air, and then the tugs tow them back to the docks when they float up. Easy peasy lots of money."

Amy frowned "I need to check the divers. I read an article about voids in the brain from prolonged or repeated compression and decompression."

Alec snorted "Not on Renaud's crew. You don't get to violate a dive table. Or outgassing time. He docks the crap out of you and the dive master. Glad I don't drink. Those guys who do get hours added to outgassing. Renaud makes us take breathalyzer test!"

"We found, or a buoy crab did, a tall ship, upright on the bottom in good condition. We are going to repair it and try to float it. It's in the deepest part of the bay, looks like it was scuttled rather than holed."

Danny nodded "End of the clipper era there were some 'insurance' losses here. The skeleton crews didn't want to be far from land when they opened the seacocks. Or it could be an extreme clipper. They didn't last long in service due to design problems."

AP

Lisa looked over from her bed in what everyone was calling the 'Girls dorm' "PHO got the word we are hiring. Somehow someone made a mailbox to reply too. It's full of, well, crap mostly, but twenty or thirty verified cape enquiries. Toybox wants to parlay about being a local."

The other girls froze and Sherrel squealed like a teapot on a blast furnace. Taylor nodded "I'll talk to dad. Ooof! Amy save me!" Sherrel had run and taken a flying leap onto Taylor. The others rolled around laughing. Amy pulled Sherrel off, eventually. Hey, it was hot, and PG to barely R.

AP

Taylor tapped her chin with a finger "The mayor has helped us, is friendly, and competent. Yes, I think we should at least donate, depending on the membership's opinion after the debate we can endorse."

Lisa rolled her eyes "Your father did the same thing with the DWU."

Carol nodded "The Travelers are clear. And have no federal warrants. I would recommend membership for them be case by case not as a group. Faultline is doing our cape vetting and her people turned up some very questionable stuff on several of their members. I think start them as day laborers."

Amy nodded "I am still working with Noelle, as are several doctors and PRT scientist. She has to be in a hazmat suit anyway, she could work on the environmental team."

Lisa blew at her bangs "The rest of them need therapy. Day labor would at least let them pay something for it. A therapist might take them then, rather than the rotating therapist the PRT brings in for pro bono work." Taylor nodded.

Carol moved on "Toybox having agreed to the constitution of the Union and elected officers for their Local are BBCU, Local number one. Tinker division, Gloverton. They have reduced their local dues and will still pay their twenty percent to the national union. L33t, Motion, and Steampunk are going there tomorrow to look at their security."

Sherrel had a glazed look in her eye "Pretty, pretty, cannons. And TOYBOX!"

Taylor sighed "We are going to have to sedate her again. Faultline, you go too, go take a look too, please, for me."

Danny snorted "Motion and this Pyrotechnical guy? They are going to crack the freaking planet."

Taylor looked at Faultline "Take a few brainbugs, a bunch of relaybugs, four or five Camera Coons, some Queens and a couple of Smart dogs as well. Find us a building for a shelter and someone to run it please."

Faultline nodded "I'll talk to Rachel. She can interview whoever we vet."

Taylor looked at Rachel who nodded. "I'll go with. Me, the queens and the smart dogs should be able to get you up and running quick."

Carol moved on to her last item "The PRT has a new deal going with the State and Fed. If prisoner capes fight Endbringers for half of their sentence it is considered complete. If they break an Endbringer truce or try to escape after an Endbringer attack it's an automatic kill order. No birdcage. Lung refused that. Bakuda pissed someone off and wasn't offered, or is a new person legally or some fucking bullshit legal legerdemain even I don't understand and, well, Oni Lee, he refused, we think because Lung did.

"E88 looks to be taking the deal. The gangs normal members are getting maximum sentences. They will do hard time. The judges have a hard on for them, even the former soft touch judges. I would say there are politics involved. We are probably going to get Rune. It looks like she hadn't had a chance to do much more than a little assault and battery at the worst. Even in the final battle."

Danny laughed "Or you know, they had to get the National Guard called out and make us make the national news. The governor is not best pleased."

Carol ceded the floor. Taylor smiled "Thanks everyone, you are all doing a super job! Oh, as a reminder this Saturday Arthur, John and Keith will be here." Sherrel pouted. Taylor sympathized. Sherrel loved Keith. When John came she didn't get as much Keith time between his two dads.

Carol Mark and Danny waited until the others had wandered off then looked at Amy, Vicky and Taylor. Mark was spokesperson "Add the girl's dorm to the rotation. One night in there and one at each of our houses."

Vicky sighed "There we go, no more wild orgies girls."

Carol gave her a glare "You do realize there are cameras in the hallways right. Brian and Alec haven't even been in that room I know Taylor and Amy are going slow and you aren't even bi much less gay. Oh, on the weekends invite Crystal and the other girls for an overnight. Then maybe they can come on dorm rotation days after a while."

Taylor scowled a bit "We will have to knock down a wall to the next dorm, girls spread. Chest of drawers, dresser, bedside tables, those closet locker things. Oh and beds. Couches, armchairs, throw rugs coffee tables. All that in days." Carol nodded, Danny and Mark were trying not to laugh, the girls had borrowed a panel truck and gone to Ikea. Who had stayed in business and built a factory up in Maine. Nearly in Canada. They had come back with the truck full. Half the union had helped unpack and put furniture together. Danny had sent the parents group pictures and even video. It had ended up looking like something out of Marie Claire. It was really nice. Kayden and Arthur had been very pleased.

In discussions in the dorm that night it was decided Taylor should go to talk to the Toybox local. Show face and check out the bug situation.

AP

In the morning Rachel promised Amy she would take care of Taylor, she took her three best dogs, Brutus, Angelica, and Judas. That might have been the only reason Amy let her out of her sight. Vicky telling Taylor she would watch Amy did the same for Taylor.

Taylor got in the van and Uber drove off. L33t looked at Taylor on her phone and handed her a USB cord to charge it. Nobody said a word.

AP

In home room Lucy and Amanda closed ranks with Amy by instinct. The girls in the class knew Taylor was off on a job by the end of homeroom.

As the morning progressed, if anyone thought of saying something untoward Vicky's glare kept them civil. Between classes Lucy and Amanda carried Amy's books and steered her as she texted. By lunch Amy floated in a supportive sea of estrogen.

The guys watched and kept a minimum safe distance. The school of females looked a little violent. Dean, the contact man, relayed information "Taylor had to go on Union business, out of town."

Chris looked over the girls "By herself? What the fuck?"

Dean shook his head "Uber, L33t, Motion, and Bitch with her three best dogs."

Carlos frowned "With Kull that's a pretty heavy team. Wait it's all three Union tinkers. Toybox became a local, they went to Gloverton. I wonder what the problem is. We'll watch and see if they need help. Dean, tell them we are here to help if they need it."

Dennis nodded "We should tell Armsmaster."

Chris shook him off "If they need us or more help than we can give then we will."

AP

Rachel wrapped an arm around Taylor and was just there all the way to Gloverton. The others loosened up after a while and it was actually fun.

In Gloverton itself and at Toybox, Taylor was her normal smiling self. Ideas flew and the local chief of police, state patrol captain and county sheriff contributed. Toybox was after all one of their only sources of tax revenue aside from property taxes.

Motion, Steampunk and L33t went full on Tinker and Uber was busy holding them somewhere within the orbit of Earth Bet if not on the ground. The law enforcement leadership took Taylor and Rachel to look at buildings for the shelter. The mayor and town manager got pulled in and contracted with the Union to take over animal control on the spot. Taylor called a variety of bugs and made brains and relays.

Brutus, Angelica, Judas and the queens rounded up a variety of strays and wildlife for her. A text had the tinkers at the animal shelter and equipping camera coons, several camera possums and four camera black bears. Taylor couldn't believe she mastered the bears. As it was lunch she called Amy who talked her through amping the bears up to the max on her ear bud as she did the work.

AP

When Amy's phone rang the girls froze, then as Amy needed data tablets and phones came out and the school's servers got hammered. Everything about black bears on the internet was in her hands in seconds. Her smile relaxed the whole cafeteria, as the conversation went on and her smile stayed, and she even laughed a little, things eased even more.

By the end of the conversation there were a lot more smiles and normalcy in Arcadia.

AP

In Gloverton everyone was amazed. Taylor worked on animals, healing and checking them all afternoon as Rachel talked to the shelter people, employees and volunteers, and picked six to work there. The Local would vote them in with no problem. Rachel was confident they could train working dogs with her support via text so the shelter could support itself at least.

The tinkers had a transport methodology so Rachel and or animals could move back and forth. Rachel held a clinic for the towns pets after lunch. Her talent had expanded to housecats. Taylor hugged her and kissed her on her cheek when she found out. Rachel smiled gently the rest of the day.

The tinkers and law enforcement went around and designed a fence, towers, and a few surprises that the Union would build from the local scrapyard for very little cost to the town. Heavy caliber turrets with coaxially mounted non-lethal at the request of law enforcement. Motion gave them her ammunition designs and Pyrotechnic had some ideas for more. Ideas that made Motion blanch. Big Rig was going to work on drones to help the DWU and BBCU, Steampunk had those plans he had knocked out on the spot.

All in all a powerful outing for the BBCU. The group loaded a teleporter gate, one that could transport a moving van, in the van and drove home happy. The Local, Law Enforcement, Mayor and people of Gloverton were pleased to have an ally as well.

Taylor and Rachel got on a conference call and chattered away happily on the way home. Well Taylor did. Rachel did toss at least twenty words in in the two hours though. Everyone besides Taylor were exhausted from Rachel talking so much.

AP

In the yard the door of the van was yanked open and Taylor was hauled out with a squawk. Amy captured her lips then an arm and lay her head on the taller girls shoulder as she steered them to supper. After giving Rachel a beaming smile and squeeze of her hand.

AP

After dinner and the whole story being relayed to everyone and the girls going to their room the older folks sat around talking drinking a beer or a little wine. Danny shook his head "That was surprisingly traumatic. I think Lisa and Dinah texted each other every ten minutes until Dinah got here."

Carol nodded "Vicky said Amy was guided from class to class by two of their friends. She was so busy texting she couldn't be bothered."

Uber smiled "You should see those bears. They would scare an Endbringer. Walking around town with vest tied to them. Local number one Member B 1-4, D 1- I lost count and the same with the cats C through way to many. The poor mice rats and birds. Kids were feeding the bears ice-cream by the time we left."

L33t held up a role of designs "Some of this is terrifying. You should see the designs for this fence and the turrets. The Town, County, and State are going to pay for the towers and turrets. The local will be set forever. The State police Captain is going to show his boss. We may be selling those Towers and turrets all over the place. Fully self-contained, self-repairing, non-lethal to S Class threat lethal, containment foam as the they are law enforcement and can buy it. Fully upgradeable to complete autonomy. If the things could move they would be Terminators, it's horrifying. They could put your biometrics in there and it would kill you before you knew it was there, day, night, any weather."

Carol frowned "That seems like a liability issue."

Uber grinned "I put a back door in while they were tinkering. We can see what they are programed for and stop anything untoward. They have Dragon security as they are on our network."

Steampunk smiled "Man we did tinker though. Complete bullshit all day long. We have to get that Teleport installed. We could rule the freaking world! Uh, you know, in a legal way." Everyone laughed.

Of course, PHO was buzzing all night long. TinMother preemptively banned VoidCowboy and a few others for twenty-four hours. Someone who lived near VoidCowboy told the PHO you could hear him screaming outside, above ground. Everyone had a good laugh.

AP

The computer in Coils last ditch bunker finished counting down, checked for a go or stand down and when it received neither sent the packet of information to the four hundred and twelve media outlets and the self-destruct instructions to all the other Coil facilities. Then destroyed itself.

The other Coil facilities being in the hands of the PRT and having been cleared absolutely nothing else happened.

AP

The world woke to pictures of the E88 capes and their public identities on most media outlets. One twenty-four-hour news channel had run with the story and the others had had to run it to stay current, the papers then ran with it.

Carol filed a trillion dollar combined lawsuit for slander and or libel in Purity, Aster and Theo's behalf by seven am that Saturday morning and had a press release covering both of their records, criminal charges pending, and the ongoing litigation by seven ten. She had been waiting for someone to screw up. Purity, Aster, and Theo disappeared from those news articles instantly, the newspapers posting retractions in their online editions. Too late as the PRT and Protectorate went after them all for child endangerment for Theo and Aster and got the US attorneys involved.

Carol cackled in the cafeteria looking at her laptop as settlement offers came in from organization after organization starting at nine. The union members looked at her and chuckled at every ding for new mail followed by wild cackling. Purity, who was down to a miniscule domino mask anyway shook her head. Theo had not even really had a debut yet and just shrugged. Mark increased the patrols by Purity's place to teams of three once an hour and in full kit with cape fight protocols. The Protectorate, PRT, City, County, and State cops waved to the patrols and they all stopped to talk a minute when they met up. BBCU, Protectorate and all.

Legend flew in with Arthur and Keith "Purity I am so sorry."

Purity waved him off "You didn't do it. Any idea who did?"

Legend nodded "Coil had a last-ditch bunker not in his records. It was an automated send. It dumped all kinds of data to the media. The Protectorate thinkers and tinkers are chasing it all down. A lot of it was very sensitive."

Lisa sat "Coil giving the finger to the world. Fits the little snake."

Purity drummed her fingers and looked around. Lisa smiled "Taylor will be here in a minute. Amy is still a little clingy."

Arthur nodded "First missions. I remember those days. Unfortunately, it doesn't get better, you just get better able to deal with it. I'll talk to her. Don't apologize John. It's not like I didn't know who you were. It's just the enormity of it was a bit much at first." He had looked at Legend as he spoke.

Keith squirmed down and ran to Motion "T'Sherrel!"

Arthur smiled "Its lurve." He got a laugh and smiled.

Taylor and Amy came in the cafeteria as Sherrel scooped up Keith and Carol cackled again. Vicky was following them and asked "Mom?"

Carol nearly crowed "I am going to break these idiots like a shotgun!"

Legend smiled "Well a silver lining then."

Carol beamed "Platinum you mean! Oh, good morning Legend, Arthur, Keith."

Keith beamed "T'Sherrel!"

Amy took Aster from Purity who wrinkled her nose at her and got ignored. Taylor smiled. Arthur asked Sherrel "Are you running that mad death machine? All Keith could say was T'Sherrel and bulldozer since he found out we were coming."

Sherrel gave him an arched brow "My bulldozer is a Fiat Allis FD 50 and not a death machine. I'm sure the excavation crew has something that needs the touch of a woman."

Danny walked over "And hundred fifty thousand pounds of hot rodded ironmongery."

Sherrel looked around "Shop Steward!" Everyone laughed and the day was better.

AP

Legend looked at Amy and shook his head "That's crazy."

"Especially when you figure out she has tuned up her sister too." Lisa smiled.

"So they spar among these derelict buildings that have already been salvaged because it doesn't matter when they knock um, let's see, five of them down on themselves." Legend asked.

Amy nodded impishly "And it gives Keith something to push around with the dozer."

Legend focused on the snorting, roaring bulldozer "Oh for god's sake. And Arthur is in there with her letting Keith drive the killdozer!"

Amy and Lisa rolled on the ground laughing. Vicky flew over and Taylor loped up with her no blades Kull fading. Vicky looked at Legends face and smiled. Taylor snuck in with "Your face will stick like that."

Legend threw up his hands. Amy and Lisa howled.

Later Arthur watched Legend clean and jerk four thousand pounds, the I beam the concrete weights were poured onto was at least ten inches thick. It was one of the middle weights in the comically gargantuan set in the warehouse that functioned as the BBCU weight room. "Well Amy does have a way to make it easier."

Purity laughed "Between that and the uniform he should be pretty safe."

Arthur watched and sighed turning sad eyes on Purity "I married such a brute."

Purity laughed again "Wait until Vicky and Taylor get in here and warm up with that one John is lifting."

Arthur looked at her "You're OK? Seriously?"

Purity beamed at him and leaned over and pecked him on the cheek "Thank you and fine. I'm upset because of Theo and Aster. We will have to move, but the way Carol is acting I think we can afford a house in their neighborhood."

"Oh, rent! I will build you a condo next to our weekend place." Arthur said.

Purity blinked "Those are going ahead? I didn't think we had the labor."

Arthur shrugged "Danny says go ahead. He thinks by the time I get the plans done and we get them approved and permitted the DWU and the BBCU will have the labor, the salvage in the bay and the salvage and demolition here will be wrapping up. Big rig built those drones that do the unskilled labor. I see what you mean. John is going to give himself a hernia trying to keep up with the girls."

Purity turned and looked "He does realize they are brutes right?"

"JOHN!" Arthur shouted. John sighed and walked over.

"Give it a week, but they are brutes and are as tuned up as they can get." Purity shrugged.

John nodded "Bullshit brutes." Arthur handed him a towel and his tablet.

John wiped his face and worked on the tablet a while "Aren't we supposed to get time and half for overtime or something Purity?"

Kayden laughed "See the shop steward bub. No unauthorized work actions."

John's eyes gleamed "Wouldn't that piss Alexandria off." He looked up and said "Suits five o'clock." Out of the corner of his mouth.

Dragon and Armsmaster walked up. Dragon nodded "Legend. Getting some real work in? Arthur, Purity."

Legend nodded "Paying work." Armsmaster sighed and nodded at all three. Dragon gave the impression of smiling. "Armsmaster?"

Armsmaster was watching Taylor work out. She was back in no blade Kull and really going at it. Glory Girl was spotting her "We needed to talk to Kull about her underwater swarm, we have an Endbringer tracker on line. We wanted to confirm some data."

"A tracker?" Legend asked

Dragon nodded "Really it synthetizes inputs from the former DEW, SOSUS and like systems, and all the seismographs in the world, most of the remaining satellites. It covers from lunar orbit to the earth's core. We are hearing some things on the hydrophones and wondered if Kull's swarm could tell what they were."

"They will be done in a minute. They have twelve reps of ten thousand pounds each and they are finished." Purity offered.

Armsmaster said "Brute, ten plus."

Legend smiled "Friends."

"Good thing." Dragon deadpanned. Even Armsmaster smiled.

In a few minutes Kull and Glory Girl had finished, high fived and floated, and loped over wiping their faces. Kull cocked her head a bit "What's up?"

Dragon and Armsmaster explained and Kull nodded "Bay of Fundy to the Delaware Bay. All the way to the mid-Atlantic ridge. More fidelity all the time. We under estimated how many eggs crabs lay. I got some brain repeater crabs in the water weeks ago and now, well, they are everywhere. That took a while until they synched up and started using all their spare brain capacity. Five submarines. A couple pods of whales. Seven ships, someone is desperate for money. No Leviathan. We don't hear anything in the earth moving besides lava and plate subduction."

"Thinker ten plus too." Dragon said, "You can hear lava and plate subduction?"

Kull laughed "Water, transmits sound eight hundred times better than air. It took me a while to figure out what the background grinding was. Then I found a tape of it on YouTube."

"Which is weird, why would someone record that?" Glory Girl asked.

Kull nodded and shrugged "Just glad they did. Some University research in Alaska, California and Hawaii. Called the poster, then his professor to verify it. Now I block it out as background noise but I can pay attention to it."

Dragon nodded "I saw that. Some researcher working on anecdotal reports of animals behaving strangely before seismic events."

Kull nodded "That's the one. Strange guy. His professor is even stranger. His thesis was pretty conclusive that they are hearing something."

"It was a good paper. He could get repeatable results by making sounds in those frequencies. Frequencies humans can't hear." Armsmaster said.

Kull smiled "I am my swarm. I smell, taste, and hear, what they do. If I want to. Crabs eat some nasty stuff. Dogs and cats too come to think of it. And there is no smell that would make a dog vomit."

"Kull gross!" Glory Girl exclaimed to laughter.

Armsmaster asked "What about whales?"

Kull sighed "That would be cool, eating krill or raw squid aside, but their brains are too big or to highly developed or something. If I can't master it I can't piggy back on their senses. And birds give me vertigo. I am still trying to get to the zoo to pin down what kinds of brains are shedding me."

Arthur smiled "You can come visit! We can go to the Bronx zoo. Well, I'll check the weather for next weekend! Bring Panacea and Glory Girl! I can show you girls around the Big Apple while Legend has to work."

Legend sighed "I do need to talk to the shop steward Purity, my bosses are slave drivers." Dragon laughed. Armsmaster looked pained.

Kull rubbed her hands together "My evil plan to rule the world is working." She got a big laugh "So Armsmaster, Dragon, I hear tinkers have to tink, want to meet some Union tinkers?"

Dragon spoke quickly for both of them "Why yes, these are ones in the custody of New Wave while their legal issues are sorted?"

Kull blinked then smiled "Oh yes, I like that. All official sounding and everything."

Legend snorted "Kull stop that. We had this discussion in the union meeting. It's not legal sounding, its legal fact. Once we get the Union certified as a Heroic organization and associate of the Protectorate New Wave can even transfer custody to the Union."

"Blow a perfectly good routine, I was hitting all Armsmaster's buttons. You are Legend, Legendary routine blower upper." Kull pouted. The others stared at her then laughed as Legend sighed.

Glory Girl rolled her eyes and towed Kull away "Come on you, time to return you to Panacea's custody. Leave Armsmaster alone." The others followed chuckling as they got offered lunch and Dragon and Armsmaster an introduction to Union tinkers.

Legend watched as the tinkers all took a table together. Kull nodded "Tinking off."

Amy sighed "Kull!" Arthur gave her a sympathetic look.

AP

The week passed rapidly. E88's lawyers spun up into a high hover and lawsuits and pretrial motions flowed like water.

The DWU got into a fast-paced groove and brought on about a new member a day. The BBCU had Purity looking into and working to remember all she could about the E88 capes so they could be approached with an offer if they were worth it. Faultline's Crew were vetting a few minor power capes, useful but minor and a couple of new triggers with major powers were in the vetting process too. They didn't want to go Wards or stay out in the world alone. They had just triggered and had no major legal issues so they were pretty much a shoe in. Both of them were in private schools and had the grades to get in either Immaculata or Arcadia. They would transfer in in the New Year and work with the Union over the summer. With the portals things like where you lived versus where you worked became even less relevant.

AP

Arthur smiled as the teleport portal against the wall lit in its eerie blue. It had been installed by the BBCU so He and John could get back and forth. The other end of it was in a room in the Union hall that had all the security all the Union tinkers and thinkers plus Mark could think of. It was a bit scary using it really. Those muzzles tracking your every move.

The one in the union hall was the 'mother' and had the capability to override all the others. It was fully self-contained, the room it was in was fully self-contained as well. Dragon had reviewed the computer security for it. The Union might have gone a bit overboard on security. He would have to talk to the therapist about the Unions level of institutional paranoia. Before they became Armsmaster.

Armsmaster, poor boy. That was a long term project. Rachel and her normal three dogs appeared, followed by the BBCU and their families. It was a day out at the zoo. Arthur had a luxury coach downstairs. And if they worked in some sightseeing on the way to the zoo and some shopping on the way back, well, what would it hurt? John was meeting them at the zoo. In civilian clothes. It was going to be a media circus. John would be recognized, mask or not. As would Panacea, Glory Girl, and Kull, all of New Wave. Purity might as well not be wearing a mask, or was that eye makeup. Rachel of course didn't bother. The dogs were a bit of a giveaway. "Welcome everyone. Now let's move right along to the bus downstairs. I have the super holding the elevators, or most of them, for us. Don't want to upset the neighbors."

Lisa, in the group of girls at the center of this, looked at her phone "Damn the PHO is quick. Someone here in town talked to the bus driver."

Arthur sighed "People know we live here. Sorry."

Danny waved him off "We knew it was a probability. Thanks for this and for letting the DWU use your portal tomorrow, and for being their guide as well."

Arthur nodded "Glad to support my Union brothers and sisters." A girl from TMZ was standing right by him as they had exited the building. She didn't say anything and Arthur beamed at her then pulled her aside "The zoo dear." She nodded and as the last person got on the bus leapt in a double parked car which sped off.

On the bus Lisa arched a brow, "Media control?"

Arthur shrugged "Amica is nice, if we toss her a bone she will stay nice. She can be worked with. That lets us keep the others at arm's length and they can buy footage from her. All of those TMZ folks are freelance. I'm glad she was the one who found out first and put in the ticket on our little outing. Fortunately that little brunette and her blond friend are in the Los Angeles office. They aren't so nice. No amount of chocolate and sympathy breaks into their little two person world."

Kayden leaned forward "It doesn't hurt that John saved her and her family." Arthur nodded and picked up the microphone to do some tour guiding

AP

John met them at the entrance to the zoo with Amica. He was having a friendly chat with her. They were both all smiles. The group got shown through the VIP entrance and the senior keeper was waiting at each exhibit for them. They and the senior vet watched as Taylor tried and mostly succeeded in mastering all of the animals and Amy examined them while petting them. At least the ones Taylor had mastered. The vet talked to Amy nearly the whole time. She got a few ribbings from Taylor about stealing her girlfriend and they all laughed. The vet had replied to the first one, disappointedly, that Amy was both too young and her husband and children would freak. Although she would take an option for a raincheck in case her husband lost his mind.

Keith got a big boy stroller that Sherrel, Steam and L33T somehow worked over to be powered and armed with nerf weapons and slaved to follow Sherrel or Arthur. It could even climb the few stairs they ran across. Asters umbrella stroller was next.

Amica went through high capacity SD cards for her head mounted camera at a furious pace. Arthur and Carol reviewed them as she pulled them from the recorder.

Taylor looked at the elephant. She allowed herself and her baby to be touched but Taylor couldn't connect to her at all. The vet nodded "So your power has a limit based on capacity. Elephants and the higher primates are very intelligent. The predators appear to be, but its more specialized intelligence. The elephants and the higher primates have 'hands' so to speak. Maybe that lead to the increase in general intelligence that reaches your limit. Hippo's brains are about the same size and you didn't have problems with them or the rhinos. The baboons and gibbons were interesting though. I would have thought they would have been too 'intelligent' as well."

Rachel offered "Pack."

The vet wrinkled her brow "Higher primates and elephants are very social as well though. So you're saying it's not sociability but the mindset that leads to pack behavior. Taylor can master the pack."

Rachel nodded "Alpha."

The vet nodded "Maybe if we went in private and you put on your costume-. OK so not in private." Taylor was the full Kull. Amica was moaning. Lisa was laughing at her. Amy tossed her a pout and got an apologetic look back. Missy the elephant rolled her eyes, you could actually see it in the video later.

Taylor looked at Missy and Charlie then sighed. Missy poked her with her trunk. "Sorry." Taylor reached out and patted the trunk that was now laying on her shoulders. "I can master Charlie, through him I can feel and communicate with his mother. I might be able to do it permanently now and without him in the loop but it's not really mastering her. It's more like a conversation."

Lisa's eyes lit up "And isn't that interesting. Telepathy. A new power. No, something you already do but different. You should try it with Amy."

Taylor frowned "I am not going to master Amy or even try it."

Rachel shrugged "Do me, Alpha." The conversation got a bit involved from there, Missy even shared her thoughts which were along the lines of family or herd and leader.

The vet finally broke during this and asked Taylor "Can I touch you?" Taylor nodded and Amy and the vet dived into a conversation about the Kull change.

John looked at Arthur "It's what I think being inside a tornado would be like."

Arthur laughed "And we have one who will eventually be a teenager. You should spend more time around them. Get used to it."

Kayden nodded from her spot by Arthur "I should too. Somehow I don't remember this being part of my teen years. Angst sure, a lot of fun too. Advancing known science and pushing powers to the absolute limit and breaking them? Not so much."

AP

The zoo visit concluded, with the medical and scientific staff having permission to come to Brockton Bay to examine Taylors animals, Amica now riding the bus and having her friend follow it they took off for Times Square, the Empire State building and all points touristy. Some very upscale shops got a shellacking on the way by.

In the evening the group settled in for a show. Phantom of the Opera. After the show the group said their goodbyes and the crowd that had been following them all day dispersed, very pleased. It had been a nice day out for everyone. A bit like a Royal visit of the younger Royals.

It made the national news, the evening talk shows, even political commentary shows. The evening papers had run it before they even got through with dinner at Peter Lugers Steak House.

The group was amused by the autograph and selfie seekers at first then bewildered when they never stopped coming, then signing and smiling on automatic. Even those who weren't so famous. John and Arthur laughed. Even Amica got a chuckle out of it.

John made sure to shake the hands of the PRT Troopers shadowing them and this got the others taking every opportunity to do the same with the NYPD and PRT troops. Taylor went full Kull for selfies with them to fusillades of flashes and the glare of video camera lights.

PHO was having a meltdown, orgasm, something, all day. Even the tin foil hat crowd was stunned into civility. Letterman called out VoidCowboy over it on Late Night and did a three minute riff on him. His neighbor reported more screaming then silence and wondered if he had triggered.

The BBCU said goodbye, gave one armed member to member hugs or cheek kisses where appropriate, effusive thanks and portalled back to Brockton Bay.

AP

John turned on the news and Arthur opened the PHO site and signed in. Both sat stunned and then laughed helplessly. There was helicopter footage of the group in Times Square. You would think Kesha, Gaga, and Lady Antebellum had come to Earth Bet and their first stop was NYC, maybe Shakira or Tupac returned from the grave as well.

The man on the street commentary was completely out of control. Bangers were respectful, young women were in love, or lust and tourist were "Well you don't see this kind of thing in Littlerock! My sister will be so jealous! I got a selfie with that sweet Kull! That right there is what a hero should be! Walking around just like a high school girl and just as amazed by the City as us, but can kick Lungs ass with her friends! Oops pardon my French. And Lung stopped an Endbringer! Oh and Glory Girl too! OMG! Panacea! Robby of course loved Laserdream. That Grue seems a nice young man as well as does Uber, that voice! Lizzy likes them. L33t, well he is a tinker, but he was nice, only a bit tinkish. Steampunk, that poor boy, whoever did that to him should be strung up by their, well you know, still and all he has made something of himself, a good Union man, and was nice. Made my Jimmy this little tractor from a coke can, right there in front of everyone. It runs and everything! Just reached in the trash, grabbed the can then handed the tractor to Jimmy, smiled and went on. Such a nice boy. Of course I nearly had to dab a loop on my George when Motion and Purity got to talking to him, they were real nice too though, had a bit of fun with George. He won't know what to think until after we get home. Hellhound's dogs are the best behaved dogs I have ever seen, and so smart! Our next dog is coming from a Hellhound shelter let me tell you! Little Aster and Keith are darling as well! Those Toybox folks as well. All good, solid, working people. All on our first day! Well I ask you, what else could we find here? I'm going to have to get some of those I heart NY shirts."

That clip ran over and over and went viral. John wound down from his helpless laughter and groaned "Rebecca is going to be a complete bitch."

Arthur nodded and laughed "The City and BBCU should hire that woman for PR."

AP

Rebecca Costa-Brown and the rest of Cauldron watched with jaws agape. Rebecca looked around "How the fuck does Kull pull this off?"

AP

Emily Piggot watched the coverage and chuckled. The BBCU was untouchable now. They would have to drop the charges against any of the Union members. They would maybe end up paying damages. None of them had killed anyone so that might be a good thing anyway. Even Hellhound. Those deaths were without a doubt the result of an uncontrolled trigger. Noelle, those rumors were just that, rumors. Though a Russian gang in the city was notably absent. Better to pay the damages and get out in front of this before they got steam rolled by the public and press.

AP

The prosecutor, on the conference call with the mayor and the governor unknowingly completely agreed with Emily. He didn't want to be anywhere near this juggernaut with shaky charges. Uber and L33t could pay damages. Hellhound's charges would be dismissed and damages paid to her, Purity, well best not go there, Union with a babe in arms, it would be a slaughter. Steampunk and Motion too.

AP

In the girls dorms everyone got showered and Taylor got surrounded. She sighed and went to work with Rachel. The other girls could tell from Rachel's smile when her Alpha connected with her. Amy was impatiently next.

Taylor worked her way through them all and the room went quiet as all the conversation happened telepathically with her as the switchboard. Thank god she could turn it off and on. Amy of course made her leave it on for her as they drifted to sleep.

AP

In the Cafeteria most of the DWU and the older or male BBCU watched the TV's and checked the PHO amazed. The DWU members seemed first very pleased at the impact the BBCU had and then excited for their day tomorrow. Danny shook his head "Rockstars. It's like Bon Jovi came to the City."

Mark grunted "Metallica. I don't envy whoever was running security, though it is the City, they must be used to it. Those bangers were very respectful."

Tyrone nodded "N.W.A, maybe Tupac but yes. Did you see those wise guys? They were very respectful too, and letting everyone know it."

Uber shrugged "That is a lot of firepower. Five S class threat hitters and then Legend. That tourist Mom was ecstatic."

Carol and Sarah laughed "George is having a hard time, I wonder how hotel couches sleep?" Carol asked.

Sarah nodded "Naughty girls."

Kayden snorted "We just talked to the man. He did seem a little stunned though." Sherrel buffed her nails on her very full top. Everyone chuckled.

Alec asked Brian "So did you get Lizzy's number?" Brian pushed him off his chair.

Kurt called out "Diver down!" That broke the room up laughing.

AP

Crystal woke up in the night and watched, then saw her cousin Vicky looking at her. Vicky grinned. Crystal wrinkled her nose at her and went back to sleep thinking how comforting it was seeing Taylor and Amy wrapped around each other. Hot too, damn media objectification of the female form! What? Grrrr. Sleep!

AP

The DWU got organized and left in the morning. The news media had seen a line of busses in front of Legends building and went live with the story. Danny talked to the reporter and gave them minimal details. The Sunday morning talk show's took up the Unions and now the Cape Union as a topic.

The BBCU went back to bed, well, if they weren't on Yard security or patrol. They watched the news and PHO through the day and smiled as the DWU had an apparently wonderful spring day at the zoo, and then being tourist. The crowds watched and were very respectful, if disappointed none of the BBCU were there. They filled the Hard Rock Café in Times Square for dinner. The cast of Phantom gave them a round of applause. The Union picked up the tab as they had done for the zoo.

George and his family were in the Hard Rock. Tourist Mom was of course thrilled and happy to meet more good solid working folks.

The media got to talk some Members and their families as they waited their turn at the portal. The membership was happy, glad to have been to the City and got the image of good solid working people driven home.


	5. Chapter 5

Leviathan oozed across the seabed, seemingly reluctantly. He was picking up speed slowly though.

Armsmaster and Dragon's system picked him up and a course line pointed from south of the Cape of Good Hope straight to Brockton Bay. "6723 nautical miles at thirty five knots. Eight days. Why is he moving so slowly?"

Dragon shrugged on the monitor "Who knows, let's take it as a blessing and get the warnings out. I don't think we need the sirens unless she picks up to her normal pace."

"Which is how he generates his most destructive waves so he will at some point." Armsmaster replied as he typed up the email and sent it to all PRT Directorates and the Protectorate with the appropriate notices so it would get immediate attention. Then he emailed Kull.

AP

Taylor looked at her phone after last period. "Fuck me, we can't catch a break." She forwarded the email to everyone.

Later, at the Yard, everyone sat in the cafeteria. White boards and computer monitors were set up along the wall and one of them had a feed from the tracker that Dragon had provided.

Kurt rubbed his chin "OK, so there are white sharks in the North Atlantic. Taylor, have them eat the fucker."

Taylor blinked "Would that work?"

Danny nodded "A couple of tons of pissed off muscle with teeth? Yeah I think they could at least do damage. See if you can get them hunting him anyway. Meanwhile everyone else, we can use the tanker as a platform and maybe move some of those other wrecks, doze up silt, rock and sand to block the fucker out and act as a breakwater for those tidal waves."

Roy who just walked in with the state emergency operations chief nodded "We were just coming to talk to you all. State and Federal emergency dollars are available so maximum effort will be paid for."

Director Piggot walked in "That breakwater is a great Idea. It would be nice to have it big enough for capes to fight from. Leviathan can be injured, so if you can attack him with sharks go ahead. Meanwhile If I could see the leadership we can start planning."

Danny looked around and smiled "Sounds like money folks, let's go to work."

Motion and Steampunk grinned. Kurt rolled his eyes "Here we go with the Killdozers." Every earth mover in every scrapyard within a hundred miles of both Gloverton and Brockton bay had already been transported to the Docks area and sat in a yard in the burnt out area before they went in to be rebuilt by drones Big Rig supplied and Motion programmed by using one of them to rebuild each different type of machine.

Amy walked up to Director Piggot "So, going to let your prejudice kill you?"

Emily sighed "You know the story?"

"I've read it. I wasn't there. I didn't run from Lung and Oni Lee though. I am willing to at least try to help you." Amy offered.

"Renick take over here. Do you have a room or are we going to do this right here?" Emily asked.

Amy smiled "We can go to the clinic. I'll have you looking twenty again in half an hour."

Emily sighed "I, you know what, fine." The leadership, now Including Miss Militia and Armsmaster watched this and shook their heads.

Taylor smiled "Amy can be very persuasive."

Roy laughed "OK, we will call it that instead of bullying. Now what is the plan?"

Taylor watched and listened as she sent calls for every shark in the ocean to attack Leviathan. She began gathering them in a huge school north and east of Bermuda.

AP

Legend arrived the next morning and blinked at the growing land at the entrance to the bay. He landed on the rig and looked at Armsmaster "How, where-"

Armsmaster nodded "It is impressive. Motion's bulldozers and Steampunk's smaller tractors have been working nearly twenty four hours. They can be remotely operated and the Union has shifts of operators running them. The Union moved the wrecks in close after scraping down to rock and starting the foundations of those three towers. Then the dozers started moving silt and sand from the bay.

"The Turrets on top of the towers mount sixteen inch naval rifles from the New Jersey. Those came through a portal on rail cars. Steampunk, Motion and a bunch of mechanic's just took them. The New Jersey museum is happy for us to use them but they want the New Jersey to get a Battle Star for it. The other tinkers are working on fire control, propellant, and projectiles. Further down are twelve inch guns then eight inch guns, the sections they are in swivel independently, can be loaded, aimed, and fired remotely by a fire direction center or manually by crews in the turrets.

Apparently Mr. Hebert knew the approximate locations of the wrecks and the Union used Steams tractors to find them. The ships that have those nearly universally turn turtle and the turreted mounts break loose and fall clear when they sink. They can be bagged and floated independently and were. Tugs then moved them back here. The ones they found at sea. An amazing number were in scrapyards. Along with fourteen inch guns and turrets. I don't know why they picked this combination. The divers are in saturation now as it was too deep to do it any other way. They may be decompressed by the time the fight starts if Leviathan maintains his current average speed.

"All of that may be unnecessary as Kull has a school of sharks on Leviathans path that can be seen from orbit. Apparently her crabs have continued to spread." He handed Legend a satellite picture that looked like a hurricane in the water.

Legend blinked. Dragon chuckled "Yes, don't piss her off, I have said."

Legend looked at the picture closer and asked "What are these lines in the water coming from Africa and from under the ice cap?"

Dragon smiled, or gave the impression she was smiling "More sharks."

"Christ. How many is that?" Legend asked.

Armsmaster deadpanned "All of them."

Legend groaned "Arthur is going to be so smug."

AP

Legend looked at Director Piggot and beamed. She glared at him. He smiled wider "Ran into Amy then Emily?"

Emily sighed "Yes, the little bully. Her and her girlfriend."

Legend laughed "And?"

"I feel better than when I graduated basic training. She decided while she had me in her grip to fix everything. Never give a powered healer permission without being very specific. Took me forever to get used to it all again. I've been working off a laptop and my tablet. Satisfied? Yes, yes, you have told me for years." She squawked when he hugged her. "If you are through manhandling me?"

"Fine. We are delivering Toybox portals with instructions for emplacing and getting them on the network worldwide. The fighting platform grows by about an acre in area and an inch in elevation an hour. A train of tank cars has delivered enough fuel for the Killdozer and its baby brothers. We are right now trying to figure out what to do with apparently all of the killer sharks in the world including what may be the last Megalodon or the largest great white ever recorded. Taylor was a little panicked and called them all, then told them to eat Leviathan. Armsmaster theorizes the brain and relay crabs were carried on the world wide conveyor current and are in every ocean. Anyway, Leviathan is going to run into the leading edge of the shark pack in about twelve hours.

"We are going to calibrate the naval rifles this afternoon."

"I've read the reports and followed the plans. This vibration cementation really works? That wall is as strong as cement?" Emily asked.

Legend nodded "Amazing. It's stronger than the strongest reinforced high tech concrete. They can aim the device that makes it for hundreds of feet. They cemented a straight wall in front of the towers, went back and dug out the wrecks because they would have weakened it. Then piled up silt, rock, and sand and cemented it around the towers. The wall is an arch pointing toward the sea, it's all adhered to bedrock. Stronger than reinforced concrete and getting stronger all the time. Tonight sometime they will stop piling up more material and cement the top of the wall which will give us seventy two inches above water. We hope to go up two feet a day for a total of twenty one feet above high tide, but the dozers are having to travel farther afield for material to pile up on top of the arch. We are bringing in material and a dredge is on its way. There is some conversation that the arch is strong enough and we could start taking material from the pile in front of it but then how would the dozers work? I think we are going to go with the draglines and a dredge. We should get much more material faster."

Emily nodded "The towers are on the bay side of a thousand foot thick arch. They have sloping buttresses transferring load to the bedrock behind them and the arch in front. We can only build a hundred foot tall on the sea side of the wall as the eight inch guns are there at the hundred foot level. Why don't we build the ocean side of the arch up to the eighty foot level, drag line path wide, say twenty five feet, and then use the draglines to remove material and put it behind that eighty foot wall making it thicker. If we have time we might finish it. Recall the tractors and they can be spreading the material the drag lines bring up so they don't have to travel just swing."

Legend nodded "Good plan. Come on, we'll go to the Union hall. We have to clear off of here or go inside for the naval rifle calibration anyway."

"Why?" Emily arched a brow.

Legend shrugged "That's what the safety people say."

AP

Legend landed and Miss Militia landed her VTOL with Emily aboard just as the eight inch fifty five caliber rifles opened up. The Union people all looked toward the towers. The PRT Protectorate and military hit the dirt as one enormous machine gun after another opened up then silence fell. Motion leaned over the railing four stories up on the Union Hall roof "Sorry! Had to calibrate the audio induction."

Danny walked up to the group of Protectorate and PRT leaders "Got those guns and their turrets from scrap yards between Boston and Newark. City class heavy cruisers. Ten rounds a minute per gun, seventeen mile range." smoke and flame appeared at the towers and Danny nodded "Ah those are the mark eight twelve inch fifty caliber guns we found. They were ordered for state class battle cruisers but then were dumped at sea for some reason. We found four ships worth of them. Three rounds a minute originally, we got them up to five. Twenty one miles range." Danny beamed proudly not noticing the horrified looks he was getting as the nine guns fired. "Ah there we go, mark seven sixteen inch fifty calibers. Those were built for the Iowa and Montana class but then dumped, well the Montana class ones. The Wisconsin and New Jersey loaned us their guns while we fix up the others. Those are off the New Jersey. The Navy sure waste a lot of money. We doubled the rate of fire per gun to four per minute and they range twenty four miles delivering three hundred million foot pounds of energy. Impressive aren't they?" He turned to his audience.

Miss Militia managed "Armsmaster is going to have a stroke."

Legend nodded "Alexandria too."

Emily burst out laughing, then said "The Union does fine work Mr. Hebert."

"Danny please."

"Danny, we came to talk to you about changing the way we are going about the wall. I've had some time as you know and I'd like to show you what I thought up. Get your engineers to look at it, see what they think."

"Sure Emily, let's go in the cafeteria. The plans are all pinned on the wall there."

AP

Taylor winced. Amy looked at her "Taylor?"

"He got the first shark, a sixteen foot or so male. Stupid thing wouldn't wait for any of his brothers and sisters. He did get a big chunk of the bastard though. Leviathan is fast in the water. This is going to be harder than I thought."

Amy looked around "Vicky will be here in a minute. She is talking to Dean. You can lay down in our room at your house and concentrate on the fight and getting the sharks all taught." Taylor nodded. Amy got out her phone.

AP

Alexandria and Eidolon gaped from the flight deck of the rig. Alexandria asked, "What in the hell is that!"

Legend chuckled. The flight deck was full of Protectorate Capes that had been gathering "Seeing it on paper doesn't do it justice. Welcome to Brockton Bay. You are looking at the anti-Leviathan wall and gun system. In about ten minutes they will be ranging the guns. They have a new shell payload. Pyrotechnical has been working on different payloads and propelling charges. This one is thermobaric and armor penetrating. It should get inside Leviathan then explode."

Eidolon scowled "How will we fight with that flying around?"

Legend looked at him "Hopefully we won't have too. All of this was relatively cheap. Ports and river towns could use this to defend themselves as could landlocked towns with just the gun systems. That is, if it works well enough to hit Leviathan."

"Who will I fight then?" Eidolon asked.

Assault shrugged "You can always go pick a fight with Scion. See if you can get him to say ouch." Battery pulled Assault away by an ear.

Legend looked at Alexandria as Eidolon was obviously contemplating the suggestion. The guns fired and shock waves crossed the five miles to the rig. "Holy Mary, mother of god!" Alexandria exclaimed. She flinched a moment later when mushroom clouds rose on the horizon. She turned like one of the turrets to Legend.

"The Navy is very interested. One of those towers every twenty miles and you could pretty much stop worrying about Leviathan. Behemoth and the Simurgh as well. Pyrotechnical is working on rounds for all of them. Tinker rounds. Three towers could handle the five boroughs. Max range is twenty four miles right now and climbing." Legend grinned, Alexandria looked thoughtful and Eidolon was troubled.

"I want to meet this Kull." Alexandria said.

Legend shook his head "She is busy with the sharks, she had to take a day off school. The evacuation officially starts tomorrow as well. The DWU and BBCU are concentrating on that now with just the heavy equipment operators working on the wall still. Big Rigs drones as well. Right now the others are diverting all the storm drains and water sources to channels that will take the water out past the wall. The pumps will only handle normal runoff and seepage plus a bit. They are running them though, trying to draw down the water in the bay in preparation.

"We should spend our time planning our actions if the sharks don't manage to take care of Leviathan or scare him off and the guns don't kill him" At Alexandria's arched brow he shrugged "Once he is inside of twenty miles he is going to get a hundred and sixteen tinker payloads on him a minute. No matter how tough he is I don't think he will stay."

Eidolon barked "This is crap! We fight Endbringers, not the damn Union!"

Legend frowned "You need to calm down Eidolon, or go find Scion as Assault said. I have just told you what we are going to do. Get with the program or get out. I am still the leader of the Protectorate." Eidolon rocketed into the sky. Legend looked at Alexandria and nodded his head toward the stairs "You and I need to talk." The protectorate capes on the platform were doing that trying to not look thing as the pair walked off.

AP

Carol came in and sat on the bed Taylor was lying in in the BBCU female dorm. Rachel nodded to her from where she was sitting surrounded by dogs in her area, not too far from Taylor and Amy's area. "How are you Taylor?"

"Pretty good. I have a system now, they attack in waves from random directions and depths. They are pretty much keeping him eaten down to about half size. The ones he left behind with that speed burst are catching up as the waves in front of him slow him down. He will still get here tomorrow but I don't think he will be able to do his tidal wave and weather trick. It is going to take a couple years to build the population of sharks back up though." Taylor sighed.

Carol chuckled "The fishermen, whales, and seals will thank you. That might let them get on their feet."

Taylor smiled "I am just watching now. The sharks sort of have the bit between their teeth. Apparently, whatever he is made of is good and really high energy. Plus, he thrashes like a wounded thing. Drives them straight to the kill. Hard on teeth though. To me it tastes like aluminum foil. Sharks are weird. If he doesn't kill them though they circle right back around until he does doing even more damage as they get energized."

"Blood." Rachel said.

Taylor thought. "Yeah, maybe."

Carol wrinkled her nose "Well the evacuation is all planned, the State is supplying transportation and the National Guard will be going house to house. The railyard is full of passenger coaches. Steampunk is in heaven. He may turn himself into a locomotive and disappear. The media are setting up remote cameras everywhere. The military is starting observation flights. The temporary water channel is done and the pumps are running. We are pumping a million gallons or so an hour more than is flowing into the Bay. The gauge on the wall has actually dropped on the bay side. A millimeter, but every little." Taylor couldn't help it, she laughed and Carol smiled.

AP

John looked at Rebecca "So? What is wrong with David?" They were in a conference room, a secure conference room.

Rebecca pinched the bridge of her nose. "I have no idea. He needs professional help."

John drummed his fingers. "Fine. After this we will get him some help."

Rebecca looked at John "How far are you going to take this Union thing?"

John smiled "As far as it will go. They are good folks doing good work. They don't even make a profit. "They fund their pension plan and training program, pay very few administrators' reasonable salaries, pay the legal department, however those folks generate income sometimes too, and spend any excess on the members and projects for their communities. Everything they touch turns to gold, or at least copper."

"They hire villains!"

"They investigate them first. One of their organizations and their HR sections. None of those villains have killed anyone. Well, that didn't need killing. I'll wait until they do that before I get into it with them. As it is, a little misdemeanor mischief and they make the capes they hire pay damages. I don't think we have the moral high ground there. One more trip somewhere and another lady from Littlerock and I know we won't have it. We have let worse people in the Protectorate and the PRT isn't exactly pure as the driven snow." John reasoned.

Rebecca sighed "Those towers are horrifying!"

John barked a laugh "Danny Hebert is very proud of them. Of course, he has a baseball bat he is going to attack Leviathan with. Anything to keep his people safe."

"The Union isn't evacuating John?"

"They have a portal. They can be evacuated to anywhere, in short order. They will work as long as they can. Portal control has already been handed off to their alternate sight."

"And Gloverton is safe for that John? We are pretty dependent on those portals suddenly."

"Rebecca, you have to give up that Chief Director position. It's making you paranoid. Do I need to get Amy in here to adjust your brain?" Rebecca scowled at him. He chuckled "She wouldn't anyway. Reset to uninjured is the best she thinks she can do right now."

"Arthur is loving me not trusting the Union when he loves them and they him isn't he John."

"He is a bit snide about it. You should see Amy about your eye before we start this mess. Leviathan survives the guns you don't want to lack depth perception."

"As long as I don't have to gain two hundred pounds for her to use to fix it john."

"You don't need two new legs, two kidneys and a whole skin or most of it. Plus god knows what else she fixed on Emily. She does look good though doesn't she? Glory Girl is dying to get a hold of her for a makeover and Parian had some very interesting uniform designs she wants to try on her."

AP

Amy led Taylor to the BBCU dining hall or conference room, "Why are we eating here Amy?"

"You haven't seen the cafeteria. It's a war room, and cape hangout all in one. Tough to find seats Babe. Plus John is supposed to meet us here with Alexandria. She wants me to see if I can do something with her eye."

"Siberian. You know I think that is a projection from a master. I can see how to do it. I did it with a shark. I made it huge. I need to practice that. It could come in handy right Amy?"

Amy stared at her for a minute then frowned, "OK explain how a projection from a master hurts people and affects things in the physical world, and powers are bullshit is not getting it done."

"Yes, oh miss specific. It's in the PRT classification, the power to create projections. If you are a strong enough master your projection can affect the world."

"Taylor! That's no explanation at all!"

"They test powers all the time Babe. Write Dr. Manton and ask him. Post it on the connections section of PHO."

Legend and Alexandria sat and Legend introduced her then he looked at Taylor "I couldn't help but overhear, you created a projection, thousands of miles away, and attacked Leviathan with it?"

Taylor smirked "Megalodon. Took a huge bite out of him. If I can make it bigger I can eat him. I need to study biology more though. It wasn't quite right. Forty feet long and the right shape and muscle mass but…maybe I'm just not used to it yet." She shrugged.

Amy looked at Alexandria "Enough master unexplained bullshit. Alexandria may I?" She held up a hand and Alexandria nodded. Amy put her hand on hers and nodded "To easy. The scar too. We will go to the clinic later."

"The clinic?" Alexandria asked.

"Yes you will have to take your false eye out. Do you mind if I ask when your thinker came on. My sister has your power set, she erh." Amy blushed a bit.

Alexandria nodded "It takes experience and you have to get over the urge just to smash stuff rather than plan things out."

Taylor smiled "Smashing stuff is fun."

John sighed "Brute, infinite. Those freaking guns were you and Vicky weren't they?"

Taylor laughed "Toybox Local improvement on a Motion tink. Dad remembered his dad telling stories about stuff from WWII at the Boston and New York Navy yards and dug around until he found what happened to the naval reserve fleet ships, then called the breakers. Then he back tracked the guns from there talking to old guys."

"Come on, lets fix your eye Alexandria then we can eat. You'll need the calories." Amy got up. Alexandria followed her as did John and Taylor. They were back in fifteen minutes still chattering away.

Alexandria was freaking a little "You just fixed my eye!"

Amy nodded and smiled "Powers are bullshit."

Taylor cracked up "See! Now, don't laugh at my megalodon."

John smiled "Controlling all the sharks in the ocean and projections thousands of miles away."

"Not all of them, the big hunter killer ones, Whites, Tigers, Bulls, Oceanic White Tips, which are really eat, sex, swim, like that. Not even all of them, I left the not mature ones out. Some of the mature females too. Have to build back up the herd after." Taylor told them.

They talked some more as they ate and the rest of the BBCU joined them. After dinner everyone went to look at the updated plans Lisa had been riding herd on and Dinah had checked.

Taylor sighed looking at the numbers on the sharks turning Leviathan back "Ten point four. Not good."

Dinah shrugged "But that ups the guns to over ninety and lowers the damage to the town to statistically zero. Both those change direction without you chewing on him the entire time."

Dragon walked in "Union Tinkers are complete and utter bullshit. Auto loaders, projectiles and propellant, both tinked to high heaven, in pocket dimensions, so no magazines to flood or explode. Redundant independent power generation to include steam turbines driven by the cooling water around the barrels and breeches converting to steam as the guns heat up stopping them from overheating. Which allows at least double the rate of fire as compared to normal guns. Now some kind of over the horizon targeting capable of tracking and providing a solution for targets moving at Leviathans known top speed.

"Armsmaster is improving the efficiency of it all and making it tiny."

Taylor smirked and handed her a Union card for Armsmaster. She froze and then howled with laughter "You knew he wouldn't be able to resist playing with your toys!"

Legend smiled "A good Union man." Alexandria sighed.

Taylor handed Dragon her union card "For your work on the fire control." The whole population of the hall froze then cheered. John included.

Lisa looked at Dragon and Taylor saw her pupils dilate for a few seconds. She would have to talk to her about that later.

AP

Taylor woke up and pulled Amy off her nipple and up to her face. Crystal growled "You two are going to turn me like you have all of these! Photon Mom will flip!" Amy didn't stop kissing Taylor. She just made a shooing motion. The others laughed as they all headed for the showers.

At breakfast, in the cafeteria they looked at the boards for notes from the night shift and Lisa nodded "Day after tomorrow, early in the morning, predawn even. Given no further changes in course or speed."

Dinah ran her numbers and updated a few on the boards. The evacuation percentage took a big jump, up to eighty six percent. Roy, getting breakfast there like every day since the warning cursed "What does it take to get that to a hundred. Damn fools!"

Taylor tapped her chin and did some math in her head "Could that be cops, firemen, PRT, and National Guard, maybe the capes too."

Roy wrote some quick numbers down, talked to Deputy Director Renick and nodded "It could. OK we need to relook that today and see when we send them out."

Lisa nodded "And how we get them back first and in place for when we bring the population back."

John was looking at the numbers on the wall "It will be finished on time. The back of that top section could use more hardening but it will only be that last couple of feet in that last twenty-five-foot-wide strip."

Rebecca nodded "Well if we don't do well this time we need to find a way to strap a rocket to him and put him in orbit."

L33t groaned and opened his notebook. Pyrotechnical immediately made suggestions. Motion got out a pencil and started refining and redesigning for less cost parts. The rest of the tinkers at the long table they had all taken to sitting at got interested. Rebecca blinked. Everyone else chuckled. Danny reassured her "It will go through a bunch of iterations, but if you can find somebody with enough balls to strap it to Leviathan, and enough skill it doesn't get damaged while they do it, it will get him to orbit."

Lisa blinked "Eidolon."

Alec grunted "It's too early to speak Bitch."

Aisha smacked him "Hey, are you supposed to be out of your tank?"

"Jesus Christ, I am never doing that again. All I had was access to PHO. Those idiots are going crazy. Who keeps posting pictures of the tracking screen? And can you PRT types please birdcage those fucking Endbringer cultist?"

Emily, sitting at another table looked at Alec and then at Carol. Carol slid her a folder out of her folio. Emily opened it and blinked "Precog Lawyer? No wonder."

Carol laughed "No, our crew turned it up. See who his father is? FYI there is a sister who isn't like him running around loose."

Emily sighed "In America somewhere no doubt."

Carol nodded "You know, if Eidolon isn't going to be here he could take care of that, while everyone's attention is on this. Probably including theirs. I mean if there was a way to suggest it without involving the whole Triumvirate."

"Worried?" Emily fished a bit.

"My daughter's girlfriend is a Endbringer stale mater killer. If Amy hadn't healed him he would be dead. I don't think it will have slipped Jacks notice. I don't want Kull chopping them into bait and feeding them to her minions, Amy just killing them with a touch, or Vicky beating them into a bloody smear. Never mind Rachel, Kayden, Alec, that boy is scary with a rifle, Brian, that cloud of his does funny things long term, Uber and L33t, or any of the other fully capable, well-adjusted, mentally agile, parahumans around here, never mind the hundreds of loyal normal humans who will get bloody in labor disputes never mind if you threaten one of theirs. They can all save that for later. None of them are killers yet and I would like it to stay that way." Carol told her firmly.

Emily put her fork down and frowned "You know, lawyers are scary sometimes."

Carol smiled "More the mother I think. I like the path things are on. Endbringers aside."

Emily picked up her tea, no sense going with the acid early, "Speaking of which, what are your thoughts on Simurgh's little dido during her last outing."

Carol nodded "And why Leviathan is dawdling. Protectorate thinkers narrowing down on something then."

Emily nodded "A new, apparently not Manton limited, grab bag cape of growing ratings."

Carol frowned then nodded "The healing and the minions plus the changer. Interesting. Even more reason to give Eidolon a message I think." She passed another folder "From our investigators. A cure for the Siberian perhaps."

Emily looked in the folder and nodded "This might make it a ruling pair you realize."

"Or a Triumvirate without one being so very broken. That orbit solution Alexandria suggested is very elegant don't you think?" Carol returned deadpan.

AP

Eidolon looked at the text with no identifying information and scoffed. Then he looked at it again. He wasn't doing anything anyway.

AP

Accord had to admire the elegance of the plan as it shaped together. It appeared to be chaos from all indicators but suddenly a wall, which the building of, even if inefficiently managed, helped the Union as it got the state to pay for the fuel and some of the labor cost of moving the scrap to the dockyard, repair cost for that salvaged earth moving equipment as well, even if it was in two stages, Guns, while that was happening the sharks. Every cape in the world with plenty of time to transport. Eidolon, the loose cannon, gotten out of the way. Someone had an interesting talent.

He took out a clean sheet of paper and thought of getting someone in the BBCU.

AP

Taylor lay in bed. Amy besides her watching her not sleep "Babe"

"He is in the main concentration now and I have great resolution."

"Sleep Taylor. They are going to set off the sirens at midnight and the final evacuations will happen then." Amy lay mostly on Taylor and wrapped her arm and a leg over her. She lightly adjusted her hormones into the sleep mode.

Vicky nodded "You too."

Rachel announced "I got it." She had evacuated her dogs besides her three best and returned.

AP

Taylor woke up when the sirens went off. She spent a minute checking and nodded. Vicky looked at her and arched a brow. Taylor told her "Feeding frenzy. Constant attacks from every angle." She kissed Amy and nudged her up. The girls got up and got through their morning routines then went to the cafeteria.

The cooks were doing their last meal and then pulling out leaving MRE's. They went all out on a steak and egg breakfast. The Mayor walked around shaking hands then left to the room they had set up in the state capitol for him and the city council. The National Guard finished their sweep and began pulling back. Bitch, Grue, and Alex left on patrol after hugs and being told to be careful. Dinah ran the numbers again and everyone nodded, it looked good. She left with her parents. Taylor moved to the control room for the turrets with Lisa, Amy, Vicky and her dad. "Now we wait." Everyone nodded.

At three seventeen Leviathan appeared on the guns tracking system and Taylor sent the sharks to deep water. The guns opened at three Nineteen with time of flight putting the rounds on Leviathan at three twenty-one and thirty seconds. They kept up a constant fire until Leviathan got under them. It was three minutes after four. Taylor brought the sharks back and they all actually heard Leviathans screams.

Vicky flew Taylor and Amy to the wall and their designated positions then joined the fliers. Leviathan shifted along the wall away from Taylor and started scaling it, right in front of E88. Taylor and Amy loped toward the fight. The strikers were giving it their all and Leviathan was shredded. Down to the core in places.

Kaiser was giving him hell with blades from everywhere when Leviathan used a water jet as propulsion and skidded up and onto the top of the wall. E88 had him hemmed in and Kaiser was in some kind of mad single combat with the Endbringer. The rest of E88 had them encircled and were taking shots at leviathan as the opportunity presented itself. Unfortunately, the jets of water were equal to the blades and the arm band thing they had been given reported 'Kaiser deceased W6' 'Hookwolf deceased W5' 'Rune down W4' ''Crusader down W4'. The rest of E88 were downed one by one. Golem slapped Leviathan with a giant stone hand from the bay and Purity hit him with a helix thing that would have leveled a fortress, to move him away from the wounded.

Taylor vaulted the capes in front of her and landed on Leviathan. Everyone watched amazed as her bladed arms and legs did damage and his jets couldn't reach her. What they couldn't see was her working to master the Endbringer at the same time. Leviathan slowed and more and more capes got in shots until Amy finally got a hand on him while the brutes engaged.

Legend and Purity cut and smashed as Alexandria and Glory Girl did the same, Kull was slashing and kicking but her main effort was now in mastering whatever this was and Amy was helping by stripping away anything remotely biological. They were soon left with a cylindrical core of material they could not effect and Amy couldn't hold her hand on. The noise had died away. Amy looked at Taylor "Kull?"

"That's it, that's what the Endbringer really is, the rest was a construct to let it do its job. I've got it mastered because it is mostly trying to build a new body."

L33t shrugged "Want to try that orbit thing?"

Legend frowned "Kull can we hold it?"

Kull shook her head "It only has one purpose, it is supposed to kill every living thing on the planet."

Uber sighed "Well fuck."

Alexandria had a million questions but cameras were running "If we space it will it come back or will the Simurgh bring it back?"

Vicky got a glimpse of something in the corner of her eye, pushed Taylor out of the way and Scion picked up the Endbringer and flew off. He disappeared. Vicky had given chase as had Legend and Purity. They returned. Legend was furious "He flew through a portal. It closed after him."

Alexandria growled, then announced "Rig for debrief everyone."

AP

The world was stunned for a while then the smiles came, followed by cheers. Then parties starting everywhere.

PHO crashed, came up and crashed again, TinMother started restricting traffic. She banned the tin hat and Endbringer cultist first.

On the rig in a large auditorium Legend, Alexandria, and Kull stood at the front. Panacea, Glory Girl, and Purity stood a step back from them. The others were sitting wondering what the fuck had just happened. Kull said "There are more Endbringers, at least fifteen. They aren't released into the world yet. Somehow Eidolon is tied to them."

Alexandria frowned "You are sure?"

Kull nodded "I am the creature when I master them. At least biological creatures. I don't know what that thing was. It felt a little like my projection."

"Fuck me. Could Eidolon be projecting them?" Legend asked.

Alexandria shrugged "We will have to find him and find out what is going on with him. Meanwhile we need to talk to you after this Kull. You just stopped an Endbringer and facilitated what will be see by the public as its death. This will have to be carefully managed."

Purity nodded "Idiots will come gunning and people will be terrified. You are going to have to make a bunch of appearances like the zoo and talk to normal people a lot. We are going to have to turn security up to eleven and break off the knob."

Taylor nodded "It isn't dead though. If it is on this planet it will be back in a couple of years. The sharks and guns did most of the work. Kaiser actually hurt the thing as well, so did Hookwolf a bit."

"The sharks were you too Babe. The guns were the BBCU and DWU which is you." Amy shrugged "You are right though, it wasn't dead. It isn't alive in the sense we are, so it can't die like us."

"Credit shared around, minimize Kull's part. Don't glorify Kaiser or Hookwolf, but don't denigrate them. Let's get this done and then we can talk about the rest." Vicky suggested. They all looked at each other and nodded. Vicky, Kayden and Amy stepped back leaving Taylor facing the crowd with Legend and Alexandria.

Legend asked "So, comments?"

Assault offered "I love cannon?" The crowd laughed.

Clockblocker added "Strong fences make good neighbors?"

Legend nodded "Both good points. All right let's start at the top. We are going to want to remember what we did so we can do it again next time. Armsmaster, if you can play the video?"

AP

Three hours later, though everyone who needed to had texted love ones, the meeting broke up having reviewed the fight frame by frame from twelve different angles. Taylor had filled in the shark fight and how the tactics she had used during it had evolved. Dragon had supplied the target acquisition and fire control data from the guns, more than seventy percent of the rounds, just over three thousand, having effect on Leviathan and essentially exhausting his regeneration, or what remained of it after the sharks. The striker's attacks followed by the brute engagements were covered as well.

Finally, the end minute and a half, surprising Taylor she had felt like it was surely a year, was reviewed and discussed.

Panacea and Othala had healed those injured as the briefing progressed. More than anyone realized as Leviathan had been producing needle like streams of high pressure water that cut like razors or gave hydraulic injections leaving areas of the body with crackling patches of, thankfully, seawater under the skin or in tissue. Sea water in the body could be dealt with easily. Oil or other liquids were much worse and caused necrosis. Othala even got her eye healed.

The group, mostly protectorate capes and the villain's they had in prison who signed the agreement to fight for a reduced sentence, watched Legend, Alexandria and Kull moving about and acting together as well as conferring on the summation and turned very thoughtful.

When they stepped out onto the flight deck, those not back in cells, they blinked at the gap appearing in the center of the wall. They turned to Kull. "It's a harbor yeah? Ships have to go in and out. The gap is a thousand feet wide. Should be wide enough for ships to pass each other. It will be a hundred feet deep from the low tide line. The plan is to prep it and keep enough material on hand to close it if we need too."

A cape from Chicago asked "How many thinkers does the BBCU have?"

Glory Girl smiled "Enough, but that is all DWU. They have plans for the wall too. Piers, freight handling facilities all of that. In the out years the bay will be for recreation and rough weather shelter. The wall will be where the freight is handled. It has one railroad track along it already. The gap will get a bridge over it for rails and road."

Legend and Alexandria looked at her. Legend turned to Kull "Did you make Leviathan come here so you could push building the best harbor on the east coast through without the bureaucratic crap and get the state and federal government to pick up most of the cost?"

Kull blinked "Uh, no? I wouldn't even know how? I couldn't master it at all other than just crushing its abilities down to nearly nothing. It's completely alien." They eyed her skeptically. She protested "Really." Then she huffed and crossed her arms over her chest. The two older heroes grinned. The others stood around eyeing the three. Their close group was chuckling.

AP

Kull, Taylor, got used to the new way of things over the next week. It helped that the female population of Arcadia closed ranks and moved as a phalanx. The National Guard and PRT cordon around the school also kept the press pushed back. After the first eight or ten of the 'National News' crews got foamed.

What didn't help was Eidolons continued absence. Rebecca was whipping the PRT like dogs to find him. John was gently encouraging and making apologies for her while working every source he had doing the same. Eidolon had gone dark to the precogs like Kull and Scion.

That wasn't the only thing going on. The Travelers minus Noelle got folded into the Protectorate where they could be watched. Noelle got a complicated costume lined with two layers of Tyvek and joined the BBCU. She became part of Lisa's and Carols group. She didn't need her bizarre powers for that. She was already a strategist.

The Federal, State, and Local governments nearly went into shock at the four trillion-dollar bill they were presented for the wall and bay defense system of Brockton Bay. Noelle's opening gambit in the fight to get it given to Taylor Hebert enterprises LLC or Hero Services LLC, and the BBCU an already registered Heroic organization and associate of the Protectorate. The thinkers, strategist and lawyers of both Unions were having the time of their lives. Danny was walking around striking Union Man poses. Roy wanted him power tested.

The HR section were not having so much fun, they were swamped with applications.

Arthur was however. Big Rigs drones were building the port facilities twenty feet above the high tide line on the interior of the wall and the old docks and boat graveyard had been reduced to open land. More drones were building an architect's, all architect's, dream of a new bayside community.

The city government was scratching their head as what they had thought would take a hundred years was happening as they watched. Roy had to be reminded to campaign. Otherwise he stayed with Danny all day. His place in history as the Mayor that started it all was already assured. Not that he had to campaign hard. The News media was running footage of the preparations and doing analysis pieces every day.

Sherrel had the tinkers well in hand and was mining sand and gravel then recovering the land from the mines in places that Arthur planned to better shape the community that was going to grow around the Bay. The bay bottom was even sculpted to better facilitate fishing, recreational boating, and long beaches. And keep all of that away from the commercial activities on the bay side of the wall.

When they weren't doing that they were improving landward defenses now. Hundred-foot towers appearing every ten miles along the borders of both Gloverton and Brockton Bay. With additional fifty-foot towers to cover dead space and the places where roads, rivers, and rails penetrated those lines. Arthur had influenced them as to a form factor or ascetic that suited their location. The ones on the main roads were nineteen fifties futuristic, the ones in the countryside gothic. The ones alongside the roads had police stations and government facilities built into them on request. Weigh stations and the like. Really built on to them. The towers were one solid grown crystal from bedrock to the height of the gun turrets. The interstate highway locations had three, one on each side and one in the median. The function of them was unmistakable.

All of that was on paper, or electrons and in the foundation stages right now but once a drone was put to work it rapidly rose to completion then the Union electrician carpenters and plumbers moved in. Next came union IT and then Kayden's Union decorators. Or that was the plan.

Mark and Faultline's groups were working at full capacity vetting applicants that made it through the HR process.

In the present, Kull, Legend, and Alexandria attended the funeral for Kaiser and Hookwolf. "Primarily to support Golem and Purity." Kull answered Alexandria "No matter how much of a Nazi he was, he was still Golems father and Purity's ex and the father of her daughter. It seemed the right thing to do." The commentators and talk shows speculated.

Legend smiled and nodded. Alexandria sighed "Gesellschaft is here and watching."

Danny chuckled "Cosanostra as well. It isn't bad to be noticed doing the right thing, paying respects, Alexandria. Those people have contacts with some people who run legitimate, very successful, businesses."

Alexandria looked at him "Like you Mr. Hebert?"

Danny sighed and shrugged "I cut ties as did Annette, because of the way Anette was treated really. Your investigators will have found that."

Alexandria nodded "They haven't cut ties with you though."

Danny shrugged "Family is family. You really can't do anything about them."

Alexandria blinked. Legend chuckled "Yes, I think we all have people like that in our lives."

Lisa slyly slipped in "Like Eidolon?"

Alexandria huffed "Well we found out what he is doing, apparently a one-man campaign against S class threats. We keep getting to the fights a little late to catch him."

Panacea sighed "Well, that's a complex run out of control."

Legend nodded "It does keep the S classes busy though. We are trying, afraid he is going to get killed really. If we can get him some help he might be salvageable. I think this has been building since Siberian killed Hero, He keeps going at the Nine."

Kull chuckled "Sorry, not wishing anything on anyone but I may have to send him something nice. Jack won't be any more able to ignore me than any of these other people. Fairly sure I really don't want his attention."

Alexandria looked at her thoughtfully "You should come to LA."

Panacea hugged Kull's armored arm closer and growled. Glory Girl started the laughter. Danny rolled his eyes "Good thing the service is over and this is the wake. Salute, to a fine enemy." He raised his voice and glass in toast. The Gesellschaft and Cosanostra observers nodded.

That incident did make it a better wake though. Theo was still glad it was over however.

AP

Taylor, Amy, Vicky, Lisa, Rachel and Crystal plus Theo looked at every car lot in town. Used and new. They found vehicles for every one of them. Nearly universally SUV's, all used. The older SUVs seemed more substantial and therefore safer to them. Then they chanced across a crew cab full sized long bed ton and half pickup. Taylor fell in love. Her extolling the virtues of her new love convinced the other girls and Theo and the dealer found himself visited by a full crew of tinkers and then, the Parents.

Danny, Purity, Mark, Carol, Sarah and Neil looked at each other in the BBCU conference room. Mark offered "Bit of a rite of passage. They are that age."

Sarah nodded "Although I will admit, I thought a red sports car, convertible, for Crystal. More of a fit for her image."

"It's not like they don't have the money either. The rewards they have gotten plus working as many hours as the law allows at good union wages." Carol nodded.

Purity laughed "Or being the main beneficiary and owning a large medical research and manufacturing company. Theo is so pissed. Medhall is so riddled with illegal activities. The DWU accountants and lawyers plus your firm are having a heyday. He may fire everyone and close it down. Amy and Taylor have him convinced it can be made to do good though. We got the City, State, Fed and PRT inspectors, regulators and tax people in on the ground floor. Saved Medhall. Some people not so much though. We may get away with a fine."

Danny drummed his fingers "We could work a fleet deal with the manufacturer. The tinkers, and vehicle shops are going to redo them inside and out anyway. Get this tradesman version as the base. The upholstery shop can knock the interiors together. A summer project for the kids. Maybe sell some tinker tech to the manufacturers. Sherrel says she can make those engines pass the new emission standards and produce at least double the power in five minutes with a scrap metal bin. Dragon thinks with a few meetings before hand they could do even better. Of course, as soon as Dragon got involved Armsmaster showed an interest. The damn things may only need fuel once ever."

Sarah snapped her fingers "What was this about buying a refinery?"

Everyone looked at Danny. He shrugged "The old Standard Oil refinery. It refined crude brought to it by train and loaded finished products on tankers for sale overseas. It also supplied the region. Building the Wall, the water operations group found a strata of oil, from leaks and tanker washouts before environmental regulation we assume. The vibration forming and consolidating method forced the oil, all the organic matter really, out and we collected it. Easier to comply with environmental regulation on the front end really. And the strata was good sand which we needed. So anyway, we filled up our tanks and someone in the material handling and stores section wrote a work order so the plumbing and electrical guys opened the pipeline to the old refinery behind the boat graveyards tank farm. The legal section found out, tried to lease it for storage, got sold it by the receivers of Standard Oil and put it in Taylor's name, or in one of her companies rather, like they do everything now.

"Folks who were bored went through the refinery and got the damn thing fired up. Lisa got selling products. The tinkers went through the place and well here we are. We get about five thousand barrels per day from the bay and the water operations guys dropped a vibration processor on a down pipe out by one of the super tanker off loading terminals past the two-mile limit and its producing about the same. The refinery has enough capacity to keep up with that, probably was designed for about ten thousand barrels a day originally, and enough storage to hold it if the flow goes up or down. It had enough storage to concentrate products for tankers, which in those days would have held up to a hundred and fifty thousand barrels. No big investment so a bit of free money for us, and the people who collect taxes on fuel, plus we put three hundred refinery workers to work. Oh and a major tax revenue source back on line and brought it into environmental compliance."

Kayden laughed "And, you know, Taylor is supposed to own the world. And Union Man fuck over the government." Danny spread his hands and grinned.

Neil got out his tablet and was flicking through pages. Sarah asked, "What are you doing?"

"Trying to find what the scale pay for evil genius protective parent is. I think I want to become an apprentice." Neil replied breaking the room up laughing.

Danny grinned "Remember Sinclair gas stations? They came with the last petrochemical resources of Standard Oil."

"Yes, I want to be an apprentice." Neil nodded.

Carol shook her head "And so ends a hundred-year old legal story. This will make the papers."

AP

The Phalanx of girls cracked enough to let trusted boys in. The wards were most of those, though no one could figure out why Dennis was included.

Carlos looked at Taylor "So Miss Militia has us scheduled for training with Flashbang."

Taylor winced "I'm sorry."

The wards blinked. Chris asked "Why."

Vicky supplied "He is going to delve into you all as a team and individuals until he finds the furthest reaches of your powers and then put you back together as a team. He uses physical exercise and stress to get to the deepest reaches of your powers. On top of that in your case he will have Miss Militia helping.

"Amy and Taylor will be there though so you won't have to scream to long. Though we will have to get Delphi to run the numbers on your second triggers for the pool."

Carlos started "What?"

Lucy piped up "Oh and if you ask nicely Amy and Taylor will amp you up!"

Amanda shook her head "I think that just makes Flashbang turn up the pain. Better go natural until he has your limits."

Lucy shrugged "It doesn't really effect the evaluations and then what the thinkers come up with. We'll have you functioning at Endbringer fighter levels before the end of the summer."

"Bullshit! When did you two trigger?" Dennis asked.

Lucy tilted her chin up "We work in R&D at BBCU. One of our jobs is team synergy and testing to make sure it works."

Amanda nodded "Cape support group. Member eighty four. Brockton Bay Local. Because, BBCU bitches!" She did the fingers to eyes and then the boy's faces thing.

The girls all gave the wards 'looks', Lucy said "Word." and Carlos banged his head on the table.

AP

School was out! For summer! The BBCU, under thirty division was laid out on the beach sizzling in the June sun on the first Sunday after school let out inflaming the libidos of people everywhere. The females were bad enough, Alec, Brian, Uber, L33t and Theo worked over by Amy and Taylor and exercised to muscle failure by Mark on a daily basis were the topping on a delicious cake.

PHO flipped out again. This time it wasn't just cell phone photos but some long lens photos as well. Those got legal notices from TinMother and other moderators. A line was clearly drawn.

Physically, in Brockton Bay, scowling police and PRT troops, amazing how you could tell they were scowling through those mirrored visors, kept a lid on the completely packed beaches. Union security was kept busy on both ends of the Wall and the water patrols from the Union, City, State, and Coastguard were busy keeping boats away from the commercial shipping lanes. For the weekend warriors safety, really. A loaded container ship, bulk cargo vessel, or tanker did not turn on a dime or stop quickly either. The pilots' association complained loud and bitterly to the Coast Guard.

Coming in the gate, or going out loaded against the tide required them to keep five knots of rpms on to even stay where they were. Maneuvering often took full power. Until they made it through the bore a tug was useless. At peak tide flows there were standing waves in the gate. The inward passage was the half on the landside five hundred yards out past the northern tower and the outbound passage the half on the long or seaward side, the wall being twenty miles long and the entrance being on the northern end dividing it into thirds. With the seaward tower dead center in front of the oyster beds to the south of the Rig and five miles out seaward and south of it. The south tower was a few miles from shore where the wall curved back to the shore at the city limits past the downtown coast beach.

A ring of towers another twenty miles long now covered the landward side and the Unions were denuding the sea floor of two hundred years of naval dumping as well as all the museum ships and monuments. Veterans associations much preferred their guns in service again.

The New Jersey having received a battle star from the department of the Navy for her guns participation in the Battle of Brockton Bay. The Battleship Sailors Association had awarded membership to the DWU, BBCU, Protectorate and PRT members who had participated on the wall or the Rig or in air operations in support of the battle.

The video of nine sixteen inch naval rifles in night surface action had given some of them hard ons they hadn't managed in thirty years. Quite a few of them had been hired to help install and perform periodic maintenance or at least supervise the crews that were doing it. All of those had been gone over by Amy and Taylor as the youngest ones had last served in the eighties.

The Battleship sailors association also got heavily involved in finding more turrets from the ships they had served on to get them back in action. The Towers took on the names and a letter A, B or C for the ship their main armament came from.

Later, as the BBCU licensed the plans and equipment, and had time to build them, other major port cities grew towers and walls.

A training center for technicians was opened and run at the Brockton Bay wall for the people to man and service those. It ran at maximum capacity, fifteen hundred students, phase one through five. It was essentially the last update of the gunner's mate and fire controlman course the US Navy had had while the last battleships were still in commission. Being run by ex Chief Petty officers it was no joke. Plus you had to be vetted by the Unions.

The retired Navy men and the tinkers wrote the updated fire control and fire direction course.

After a day of sizzling on Sunday, Monday brought a surprise when they were all loaded up in a bus and taken to the railyard to watch their trucks be unloaded and the dealer prep service start. Twenty of them. Taylor leapt on Danny and took him to the ground. He laughed until he hurt himself as she wouldn't let go. Eventually he wiped her eyes with a thumb and asked "So you like it?"

Taylor finally let go, leapt up and flew to her midnight blue metallic truck. Danny sighed "I'll take that as a yes." Mark gave him a hand up. He had Carol to share the love with so hadn't gotten the full Kull, and Amy had fixed their ribs while she hugged them.

Roy showed up and looked at the trucks and sighed "Danny! Damnit how are my cop cars going to keep up with one of those?"

Sarah replied "They better not have to or it will be sitting in the driveway for a year. After the Tinkers get through with them it will take voice print and retinal scans to even sit in the damn things so they won't be stolen."

Roy blinked "Say, what will all that cost?"

Danny laughed "We will let you know a per unit cost when we get these done. Thinking of the city fleet?"

Roy nodded "So, got a barbeque lined up, campaign event, thought you might like to come though. Down on the boardwalk next Saturday."

Danny smiled "Sure Roy, happy to support our friends."

Roy smiled "Thanks. My challenger is getting help from upstate."

Kayden frowned "Didn't we fire your challenger ahead of him being charged with bribery?"

Carol nodded "Probably need to look into why he hasn't been charged yet. The states attorney has the briefs as does the US Attorney."

Danny nodded "I smell a rat."

Roy frowned "Or they might be turning him on a bigger fish."

"Still not somebody we want for Mayor." Carol said. The others nodded. The parents braced themselves for a returning wave of excited teens.

AP

Danny looked out in the construction sites where the oldest most derelict warehouses had been and the ever shrinking prison camp was "How do the tinkers manage to turn a perfectly good, brand new, truck into optimus prime junior in a week? How does that not violate the warranty?"

Tyrone laughed "Those guys in the blue jackets are manufacturer's reps, they are ecstatic, that's how."

Danny sighed "Seriously, Taylor just did a cartwheel or her truck did. How is that not unintended use?" Tyrone laughed, howled really, bent over at the waist with tears streaming down his face.

Mark Johnston the head of security nodded "See the cameras, this will be an ad by tonight. Besides 'The truck Kull drives.'

Tyrone straightened up "Or the one with Panacea's setting her on the ground and her petting it."

Mohammed, the upholster's shop foreman nodded "I don't think anyone has a hundred and seventy grand to pony up for a truck though."

Shirley Carnes head of contracting snorted "Shows what you know. We got a hundred orders already. Better hire some more leather workers Mohammed."

Mohammed sighed "What we really need is a tannery."

Danny perked up "There used to be one behind the slaughter houses at the end of the train yard, in that meat packing area we haven't touched yet!"

Charlie Waters, the plumber's foreman, rolled his cigar around in his mouth "She did another cartwheel. We haven't touched it because we are terrified of what we will find. Tanneries used chromium, lots of it. That thing has been there two hundred years."

Danny shook his head "Bark, when the logging industry declined they couldn't get bark. The old man said white oak bark was what kept the tannery running. Once it quit they shipped the hides raw to somewhere. Mexico I think. It got to be more profitable to ship them than to tan them here. Then the meat packing moved farther west and, well, that was it."

Mohammed nodded "Vegetable tanning it's called, some of the best leather. Brain tanned for leather worn next to the skin. Chrome is quick, that's why it won out."

Danny looked at the group "So if we start the slaughter house back up we would have hides and brains. We still need bark though."

Mohammed shrugged "R&D I think no?"

Charlie nodded "And a survey on the stock yard, slaughter house, refrigerated warehouses near there, and tannery. How much would that save us though?"

Mohammed shrugged "A thousand dollars a truck. We already make and sell things from the offcuts but unmarred hides are expensive so we use unmarred sections of color matched hides. It takes five hides on average for one of those trucks. Three thousand dollars' worth of hides. We charge by the square foot used, eight dollars and fifty cents for the material. We make items and sell them to use up the extra. They actually sell well. Parian does it. We can get half again the value out of that.

"Vegetable tanning is slow and labor intensive, just so everyone knows. Environmentally safe through. We could just sell the hides on too. Wholesale they are three hundred dollars a hide."

Charlie added "Stinks." They all looked at the plumber with his cheap cigar, burning, clamped in his teeth. He shrugged. "What about Gloverton. They could be a customer as well."

AP

Taylor was lying on the beach again. "You seem to be doing a lot of this." Amy smiled.

"What?" Taylor asked eyes still closed.

"Lying on the beach teasing people." Amy rolled toward her on the beach blanket.

"It's been a bit of a year Amy. I think we are allowed. Besides we work the maximum number of hours allowed under the law. I'm still studying two hours a day, and we train, so I think we are allowed a weekend. If people want to consider this teasing then I can't really help them. I'm sure they will eventually get over it."

Amy opened her mouth and the woman on the beach back rest next to them spoke. "You tell em Kull honey. We came in from Altoona, the kids wanted to see the wall, and well lightning never strikes twice right? Anyway you have had a heck of a time. Lung, then that crazy Bakuda person and those gangs, then Leviathan! Well, you just lay there and rest Honey. That woman from Littlerock was right. You all are just nice regular folks."

Amy looked at Taylor and clamped her lips shut. Taylor glared at her as her shoulders shook. On and off through the day they talked to Mary Willows, her husband and her three kids fifteen to seven, two boys and girl in the middle. Carl Willows didn't do any better with Sherrel and Kayden than George did. Mary rolled her eyes a lot. It was a lot of fun. Mary and her family were very gregarious and inclusive. Faultline's crew weren't sure of the beach and were a bit wary when they were folded right in and plied with questions and Pennsylvania wisdom in equal measure. Most of them being case fifty threes never seemed to occur to Mary or her family. They stayed longer than they would have otherwise and left not quite knowing what exactly had happened. They sat around Palanquin later a thoughtful group.

Mary's interview, after the BBCU packed up and left late in the afternoon, went international too. Legend watched it and laughed. Arthur smiled "You can't buy that kind of thing. Next weekend we need to go to the beach. It looks fun and Keith will love it."

John nodded "Not like we are having any luck catching David. Or he is having any luck finishing the nine."

AP

Emily Piggot looked at the reports and crafted another email "Kill the master. Then the others. If killing Bonesaw bothers you, don't. Capture her in a force field and bring her in. We will deal with her." Emily hit send. 'We will put her in a suit like Noelle's in a glass cell full of Lysol. Maybe the birdcage. Just get it done you walking ego.' She thought, unkindly.


	6. Chapter 6

AP 6

Taylor arrived in the dorm room and blinked. "Uh Hello?"

The young blond in the domino mask grinned at her "Missy, this is Lily. We're wards. Miss Militia made some kind of deal to put us through some intensive training with Flashbang, and since the facilities are here, well they moved us in for the summer. Kind of a camp I guess."

"Oh my god! Girls? Does Mark, erh Mr. Dallon, uh Flashbang know? Jeeze he has been working with us and we are all, well, you'll see. OK this will be fine. Amy and I are here and can take care of anything really crazy that happens. Hmmm. We need to check you two. She'll be up here in a minute and we can start. Taylor, Taylor Hebert." Taylor wound down.

Missy looked at Lily and then back at Taylor and crossed her arms over her chest and tapped her foot. "So, you have some ideas about women and training?"

Taylor frowned "Oh! Sorry. No, I expect you are fully capable. There are some physical differences and Mark doesn't quite get that. It won't matter in the testing phase but it will as you build up and the guys upper body comes on faster than yours. You will do better at core and lower body stuff. We have learned some techniques and stuff that are relevant to females. They will help. Meanwhile we will straighten out any issues with the plumbing before you start. Guys have it easy. Not so many things to have issues with. Though more to take care of in a fight if you know what I mean."

Lily nodded "They are still over with Parian freaking a bit. So Arcadia? I got Immaculata. Missy will be going to Arcadia in the fall. I'm registered at the University too and taking some classes there."

Taylor nodded "Crystal, you know her? She will be in here with us. Delphi, I think she goes to the Arcadia feeder grade school, Henderson, she will be in here too."

Missy blinked "Dinah Alcott? Cool. She is funny. Don't gamble with that chick though."

Taylor nodded "You do that space manipulation thing right. I need to show you some math."

Lily sighed "Oh no not another one."

Amy walked in "Another what?"

AP

The group all met for dinner in the cafeteria and Dennis snorted "Arcadia cafeteria much?"

Lucy looked at Amanda and opened a notebook she had with her for some reason "Clockblocker. Observational skills poor." She actually wrote it down.

Dennis whined "Hey no fair, its afterhours, evaluation over." The others laughed. Lucy and Amanda high fived.

Amanda looked around "So we were spit balling at lunch. We have those portals and an invulnerable cape. So why don't we put a portal in front of Ash Beast and send him to Ellisberg, then Gary, then the rest of the quarantine zones?"

Carlos blinked "Uh. Would the portal live through it?"

Vicky nodded "Even if it didn't, if it would live once, we make them. We could make matched pairs of them for where we wanted him they wouldn't have to be in the network. It would probably be expensive but if it worked it would be worth it at twice the price."

Lisa nodded "A ring of them around ash beast all tuned to the one for Ellisberg and we don't even need the invulnerable cape."

Chris nodded "That gem needs to go up the chain. I'll get with L33t and write it up."

Carlos nodded "So Scion ran off with Leviathan or what you two left of him."

Amy snorted "We weren't alone. You all were even there. That was him. The rest was some kind of construct, biological only in the widest sense. What Scion did with him is the question."

Taylor shrugged "A couple years and someone is going to find out."

Dennis smiled "I don't think it will be here so I'm not water proofing my next phone. Otter cases are expensive." Everyone looked at him. "What? Wards salary here. Not Union scale."

AP

Taylor had decided one Union meeting a week was enough until they got indicators of another crisis. The BBCU still gathered in their conference room after dinner, out of habit by now.

Carol nodded "Yes we need to look at that portal thing. If the Protectorate and PRT don't take it up it might be worth spending the money and time on to do it ourselves. That goblin is too close. So are some other threats." The younger people had explained what had cropped up at dinner.

Taylor nodded "You know I can't use living things on Behemoth. He would just burn them up. That little Ash Beast trick, if it works, would do the same to him as a sharknado. If we bought enough time we could get guns in place then and work him over. Sorry but I'm a bit of a one trick pony."

John, who was down to take care of Keith while Arthur worked on his projects in the area, nodded, "And maybe he could stop Scion from running off with Behemoth so we could put him on ice somewhere. Like in the orbit of Neptune. And not that we noticed, the one trick anyway."

Arthur smiled "You'll have to excuse John. He is still a bit angry about Leviathan being body snatched."

Lisa laughed "Aren't we all. We got the rockets ready now though so next time we won't be standing around trying to decide what the hell we are going to do. Taylor can master whoever it is still and we can strap him in and light the fuze."

L33t nodded "We got good measurements from the video. If they aren't to different its bye bye birdy."

John groaned "And the R&D section will have another reason to flip out. They want to get to that core thing with every sensor and measuring device on the planet. They are planning anti Scion defenses so they have a chance to play with the next one."

Lisa shrugged "They better wear pressure suits. Once we see Scion we are launching."

Aisha frowned "Won't he just chase it down? Maybe we launch a portal now. Then we could portal them both to orbit."

The Tinkers and thinkers all groaned and grabbed their heads. Amy sighed and stood up, moving around to relieve headaches. Danny looked at Arthur "From the mouths of babes."

"Mr. Hebert! Thanks! Sorry but you're a bit old for me." Aisha grinned and preened. Brian glared at her.

AP

Dragon appeared in a monitor and looked at Colin who sighed and rubbed his temples "Yes the permutations of strategy involving portals and using the existing threats against each other is nearly endless. This is going to take a while."

Dragon smiled "I have an idea for a prison on Mars."

Colin closed his eyes "Ouch."

AP

Agnes Court looked at Uppercrust "So, this organization, the Dock Workers Union, broke the code on parahuman business ownership and participation. They aren't the only ones."

Uppercrust nodded "They are the only ones with political pull to include having the Triumvirate, besides that fool Eidolon, and the PRT in their corner.

"We will stay away from them until they impinge our business. They are growing, a confrontation will likely occur. In the mean time we can study them and ways to hurt them.

"Their level of diversification is extreme. Defense, energy, metals, food, material of all kinds, medicine, machinery. Everything a modern society needs. Admittedly on a small scale, but growing.

"Fortunately, in markets where we don't have a presence. We also have no idea where they will go next. We will consolidate our hold on our current territories while we learn about these people."

Agnes nodded "Bastard Son won't like that."

"I don't like there are still villains interfering with our operations in our territory. He needs to shut that down before he tries to bite off what is reported to be multiple S class threats in the DWU. You will need to see to that and start establishing some dominance over him if you hope to lead upon my demise."

Agnes nodded. She wasn't callous. Uppercrust was both old and infirm.

AP

Danny walked to the power house on his daily rounds. He hadn't been here in a while. He opened the door and found himself in a quiet cool room with not one but now two giant engines. Alfred, the powerhouse manager smiled at him "Different isn't it. Ms. Dallon fixed my hearing too. I'm not sure what to think. All the bright lights and all. Hardly break a sweat anymore."

"You don't look to troubled. Uh where did that come from?" Danny pointed to the new engine and generator it was hooked to.

Alfred laughed "Tinkers. They seem to operate on waste not want not plus they can't see a piece of machinery and not 'tink out' as the kids call it. That is the engine and generator gear off the supertanker. Its switch gear was used to build the switch house or rebuild it. Along with what we had. The engine has been tinked of course, as has the generator. Nearly double the output, a hundred and sixty megawatts is where it really likes to run, a hundred and two rpms.

"The other freighter engines are in the bays around and can be brought online if demand picks up. One of them is being used for compressed air and another for hydraulic pressure.

"With spares, of course. Between the other generator engines, they can replace ninety percent of the output of our two main engines or double our generation if the demand comes in. The BBLGW has control of them really. They provide the heat for the Docks, the new installations on the wall and the refinery. And burn number five and six fuel oil. The return lines on the steam keep the oil storage tanks at a hundred and twenty degrees and then the day tank here is kept at two hundred degrees with primary steam off the engines. We get through about a thousand tons of oil a day, just barely keeping up with the refineries lowest output of bunker oils, if we are running everything at full load. The Tinkers really like things being efficient. The surplus is sold to any vessels that need it at market rate. Otherwise we would need more tanks in the tank farm at the refinery.

"The tinkers got the system extracting sulfur down to the EPA requirement at the refinery and they sell that too. No idea who to.

"Profits about twenty-five thousand dollars a day." Alfred beamed at Danny.

Danny laughed "OK fine. So, when we fire up the slaughter house, tannery and refrigerated warehouses what's it going to do to you?"

Alfred shrugged "Make more money I guess. We have the extra capacity like I said. That's before steampunk puts in his steam turbine generator to use the steam during the summer. Closed system, if we don't use it for heating we got a problem and the EPA won't let us dump heat in the bay. Plus, the fishermen would cut our nuts out. The lobster and oysters would be the first to go and they are big profit from what the boys on the docks say. I remember the days when only us poor people ate lobster and oysters.

"Us stirring up the bay and sucking the oil out has a boom going on right now. Apparently, the cannery can hardly keep up. Got three shifts working seven days a week and are always hiring more." He led over to a computer screen "They're pulling eight megawatts. Never drops off. With the improvements, the tinkers made to the motors and us supplying air and hydraulic power that is a lot of power. We charge them cost rather than market so it isn't that high a bill, lets them keep production cost down and profit up."

"Which means more workers, more production, skippers paid good prices for good catch. Where are the fish coming from though? Its only been a couple weeks since Leviathan." Danny asked.

Alfred nodded "My oldest, Julie, the professor over at the University, marine biology, who knew that would actually pan out? Anyway, she says the fish follow the food and well the food right now is coming out of the bay. Of course, that food is plankton and baby fish, crabs, shrimp, all of that. She says it will be a couple of years before the better environment in the bay causes, get this, 'An explosion of life of the nature we prey on'. Vegetarian too nowadays. No idea what got into that girl." Alfred looked at Danny laughing and grumbled "Sure, laugh it up boss, yours is a meat eater, dragon slayer, Endbringer ass kicker and got the best healer in the world as a significant other. I got weedy long-haired freaks who wouldn't know a hod from a boathook at the table on Sundays."

Danny was bent over hands on knees. He held up a hand palm out and waved it helplessly "Sorry." Alfred waved him off.

Danny wandered over to the cannery through the busy, ever expanding dockyard along the bricked paths. He waited for the signals at street crossings. A lot of the vehicles were autonomous and while they supposedly wouldn't hit you and were going twenty-five miles an hour who wants a trip to the infirmary? Even though with Amy or Taylor you would be back at work in twenty minutes and fifteen of that would be ass chewing and pay docking.

He got to the cannery and reached for his ear pro as he opened the door. He stepped through and drifted to a halt looking at a stainless steel and tile wonderland. Marilyn the manager saw him through the glass front of her office and came out on the floor. "Different world."

Danny nodded "Is that machine gutting and cleaning?"

Marilyn smiled "And about five times as efficient as the top of the line commercial model it used to be. Tinked of course. Mostly we watch the machines and do clean up nowadays. Well except for the specialty species, Tuna, Swordfish, those go on a plane nearly as soon as they come on the dock. They are auctioned right there with the captains watching. Our guys pull the cores and put them in machines and it does the grading. Not subjective like it used to be. We finally got in on the systems the Japanese have been pushing every one toward for years. Helps they supply the machines, and their technicians check them once a week. We get ten percent, free money sort of. Two auctions a day. Squid we still do by hand but the day shift gets them in the morning. The fish markets got a portal, the big ones. We send carts through as the stuff is sold and they send empty carts and flats back.

"Smoking we still do by hand as well. That's where most of the employees are now. Over in the smoke houses. That's all tuned up and computer efficient too though. Compliance with FDA and EPA regs. Pain in the ass that they are. It does give a standardized repeatable product though. We did keep one manual smoke operation going. Got most of the older folks working there and they turn out super premium stuff that we can't afford to eat. New York, LA, Chicago too. All the big cities where people have to much money and time on their hands get that.

"I remember a stream of blood and guts going back in the bay a foot deep in a ditch." Danny marveled.

Marilyn leaned forward "You wouldn't believe what Asians eat. What they don't is blood meal, bone meal, or in the lowest grades, fish meal fertilizer.

Grind up the solids with seaweed we are clearing anyway, or the beach cleaners pick up when they run at dawn, cook it down to ten percent moisture, bag it and sell it for fertilizer. Or sell it in bulk. Supposedly great stuff. Golf courses buy it by the carload."

"So I think I know how this happed but why don't you tell me what you think?" Danny asked.

"Well it was Steampunk first. He fixed up the old machinery and got it running like well trained dogs. That of course upped production. Then we got some deals on state of the art stuff and brought it in and He worked that over. Production went through the roof. We made enough to pay captains well. Word got around. Now we pull boats from Canada all the way to the Delaware bay. Uber worked over our IT so we know the market worldwide. In some cases, we make the market. Fish stocks have recovered because European boats don't dare come this far with the Endbrigners around.

"Right place right time with the right people. All those years of believing and hard work finally paying off." Marilyn smiled.

Danny nodded "We were and are prepared for the opportunities."

Marilyn nodded "Doesn't hurt that the BBCU fucked up Lung and Leviathan. Idiots should have known not to start a fight with dock workers. Even those baby ones." She grinned at him. He laughed and waved on his way out.

AP

Alexandria looked at Contessa "The path to victory now involves the BBCU so I am supposed to get friendly with them. What the fuck! Seriously, what the fuck?"

Contessa sighed "David is, well, broken. From what we can tell those shards that are the Endbringers have a purpose and after weeks of intense work we can say that that purpose is, or part of it is, harvesting shards right before the warrior begins destroying planets and harvesting them for their energy. It should be him and the thinker doing it but as we know that isn't going to happen. The BBCU have a method to keep the Endbringers and the other S class threats contained, increasing the number of natural triggers who survive. This will increase our odds of success against the warrior.

"Somehow David has something to do with the Endbringers. We are working on it. We will figure it out and get him back here, or get him back here and figure it out.

"You had an interaction with Kull and are happier than you have been in five years. Go have more interactions."

Doctor Mother nodded "Spit in this tube before you go. I want to check your levels."

Rebecca closed her eyes and counted to ten.

AP

Alexandria strolled out onto the sand flipped her towel out, dropped her wrap and sat down. She turned to Kull who grinned at her "Pretty seriously hot. Thought you would have a better tan. Need us to oil you?" Alexandria rolled her eyes in the domino mask she was wearing. Kull shrugged "So, all that is issue? The Towel, the wrap, the bikini. I mean, just asking as it all has Protectorate logos. Our members buy their own bikini's. Well Parian makes them, and then decides what you are allowed to buy. Do not ask her for a one piece. You get two swatches and piece of dragline silk then. Just go with what she puts you in. That always works out better. Plus its cheap for members."

Alexandria finally smiled "As my branding people in LA found out. I could and can hear the screaming all the way in my office when she stomps on one of their ridiculous costume designs."

Kull chuckled "Yeah. The other side of those discussions are her people going to lunch early while she destroys something or her terrorizing squatters and heavy equipment operators riding around on a life sized stuffed Tyrannosaur."

Alexandra blinked then laughed. "Not to change the subject but changing the subject, what is up with your powers."

Kull huffed "I don't freaking know, I've had them a month! Well several now. But it's like riding a lightning bolt. It's all fine until you touch a ground then boom! Mark Dallon thinks some of us are not as limited as others. We think by that he mostly means mentally. On top of that he thinks you don't know the true extent of your powers until they are stressed to the breaking point. Unfortunately, that could get you killed. Bit of a limiter on most people. You know, those with survival instincts. So he stresses us to see what happens in a controlled way. It's exhausting. Last, but not least, he says the classification of powers and their rating has been done by, well enemies, looking for a way to plan and train to stop those with powers."

Alexandria leaned back on her arms and soaked up the sun for a minute. They all watched the harbor patrol chase a jet ski with a guy holding a camera with a long lens on the back of it, lights and sirens going and motors quickly winding up. "Flashbang is notoriously broken, no offense."

Amy nodded "He is better since Kull showed up. He suddenly became the power and training guru. Also, he is the one that sets up our teams. I think the results of that speak for themselves. As for being broken, we all triggered. If you believe the PHO boards tin foil hat crowd, some of us didn't but they drank some magic potion that had a high probability of turning them into case fifty three's. Good folks, at least the ones we associate with, but still." Amy shrugged leaning back on her arms. Heads went up and down and collected slaps then glares. "Hard to tell who is the most broken of us. Second generation capes less maybe. Feel good triggers maybe as well. Powerful combat capes? Horrendous things lead to those triggers."

"Then there is the weirdness. Tinkers are allegedly from long term stress but thinkers form the same kind of stress that builds and goes boom quickly?"

"I think we don't really know what we are talking about in the sense of truly having an understanding. Maybe because we are unwilling to discuss and document triggers in any kind of truly scientific way. Powers might as well be magic. Maybe if we have another hundred years of them we will come out of the dark ages and into the renaissance."

Glory Girl nodded "Until then Powers are bullshit and it's how you use them that counts. They're yours. Know them and use them as best you can. Dad's test and exercises help with that. And Kull is the most bullshit of all, ever.'

Kull sighed "Except for flying."

Alexandria frowned "Do birds really make you dizzy? But flying insects don't. What about bats?"

Lucy sighed "Oh fuck me." She got out her notebook.

AP

Alexandria came back to the Union Hall and the girls' dorm for a shower when they left the beach. Afterwards they all sat in the cafeteria and Alexandria looked at the white boards full of projects and their status and the touch screen monitors where you could pull up detailed list down to cost estimates.

She saw the monitor with Dragons face on the articulated arm hanging from the track in the ceiling over a seat at the tinker table. It was split and Armsmaster was in it with her. "Does anyone even know what you all have fingers in?"

"Charmaine in accounting. I think she is thinker ten. Plus, she has an eidetic memory." Lisa supplied, then went on, "Danny Hebert as he walks around a couple of hours a day talking to everyone. Or gets Taylor to drive him as she needs practice for her permit. Arthur, as he has looked at everything building wise like Parian does work so she can do the clothes."

Vicky shrugged "Taylor as she has all the brains in the ocean to keep track."

Amanda smiled "On land within five hundred miles of here and Gloverton too."

Arthur, back from a shower and washing the sand off of Keith looked at Alexandria "You should come look at a condo. The one next to ours is empty and it appears you will be spending some time here."

Alexandria groaned "I will. Plus I was supposed to talk to you and then Danny Hebert about office space. The Protectorate has decided a permanent presence here is in order."

Legend sat "Did I miss a meeting?"

Danny asked "How big a presence? I'm sure we could lease you something, but you have the Rig?"

Alexandria nodded "Non-combat, thinkers, tinkers. R&D to get closer to your R&D. Some discussion of a secure data center. The PRT is going to expand their presence as well. Brockton Bay seems to be where the action is. We are only months behind the curve this time rather than years."

Lisa nodded "The weaponization of Ash Beast. They liked that one huh? You know that happened over lunch one day."

Alexandria nodded "Exactly why they want office and lab space and privileges for the cafeteria here."

Danny looked around and shrugged "It was built for a membership of three thousand. The highest we ever got was twelve hundred actual members. We may beat that but I doubt we would ever have a problem. The Chefs are happy to run three shifts a day. They run a training course too. Most of the chefs around town are union members. The family owned ethnic restaurants are the only ones where they aren't. They even have contracts for supplying baked goods to groceries and the like. Most of the kitchen, the commercial kitchen and bakery are under us here."

Arthur nodded "Hence the windows around the bottom of the building. A bit old school in equipment and layout but it all runs and everything served here is from fresh. Impressive."

Kull sighed "Another bunch of meetings. Can we go finish off, say, Nilbog instead?" That got nods from those under twenty and laughs from those older.

AP

"The Slaughter house Nine have been definitively sighted in Boston." Emily Piggot told Danny Hebert. They were talking on their tablets.

Danny sighed. "How?"

"They apparently went to recruit a cape there. They ended up mixing it up with a group run by a cape named Accord and a group known as the teeth, I suspect you remember them? Eidolon, the PRT, Protectorate and civilian authorities have gotten involved. As you can imagine its fairly ugly." Emily said with a shrug. The monitors behind her showed some of it. "Legend and Alexandria are there. Casualties will be coming in to here, we are closer than New York. We wanted to use any buildings you had as temporary hospitals."

"Its Taylors Birthday." Danny pinched the bridge of his nose and looked out the window. "Ash Beast the bastards Emily."

"We are working on it right now Danny. If we can get them into a section of town we have already evacuated then we will. Your people in portal control are already on it and the Portal circle is ready to emplace around him. I know its Taylors birthday. I'm sorry."

"Send Othala out of the lockup. I'll get working on a building. Kayden can take custody of her. Emily, if they come this way it'll be guns. The guys in the CIC will already be putting in the information."

"I know Danny. If you think that's bad you may have to break in a new director. I sent Bakuda to Boston with a specific mission, target and Miss Militia.'

"Fuck Emily! What the fuck? Why wasn't she in the birdcage? Some prison anyway. You know what, we will talk about this later. I'll call you when I have a building ready."

In Taylors room Vicky looked at the other two. Taylor was lying with her eyes closed. She must have felt Vicky looking "Nope, its my birthday. I'm laying here sexing my girlfriend up until the first casualties the regular doctors cant handle arrive. Then I will bring her to you sweaty and sticky."

"I beg your pardon? I am having a shower before I treat patients thank you very much!" Amy replied.

Vicky rolled her eyes "I'm going to cook breakfast. Before you two make me sweaty and sticky." She got up and got a robe and slippers on and padded out.

Taylor sighed "Well it isn't us this time. What the fuck is wrong with the world?"

Amy nodded "I know. It's enough to make you think the tinfoil hat wearing crowd may have something after all."

Taylor nodded "Lisa and her crew can look at it between reports of death and destruction. I think we will be a bit busy. Uh Amy?"

Amy popped off a nipple "Busy now." She latched back on and maneuvered on top of Taylor.

A few minutes later Danny paused outside Taylors door listening then smiled "Happy birthday Taylor."

Vicky met him in the kitchen with waffles, bacon, and coffee. He eyed her "Where is Dean."

Vicky looked upstairs, blushed a nice pink and sighed "It isn't there yet."

Danny nodded "Take your time. You all are just getting to that age."

Vicky snorted "Damn media."

Danny laughed and ate. He headed out after "I'll call when we have the building, let you know which one. No need to come in until triage is up and running." He turned to the door then back "Can you move Amy's truck?"

AP

Danny got to the dockyard as the sun rose and looked at the people and vehicles moving with a deliberate urgency. He parked his sedan and went in the Union Hall. Lisa met him in the hall before his office and started rattling off details. He nodded then said "Good, great work, now go get dressed and some breakfast. It is going to be a long day." He smiled. Lisa looked down at herself and her Mickey Mouse boxers. She blushed, nodded, and trotted off.

Danny brought his computer online and opened a conference call. He soon had the foremen and Director Piggot on. It was thirty-one minutes since Eidolon had attacked the Nine as they watched Bonesaw killing Blasto.

Twenty minutes later Kayden took Othala and blasted off to Boston. They would send packaged casualties that could not be handled there to a former fur storage facility that was being swiftly but thoroughly converted to a hospital by the Plumbing, Electrical, and Carpentry shop and several drones per shop.

The HVAC shop was working on the climate control for the building. A four story two hundred thousand square foot behemoth with brick walls three feet thick and few if any windows. The patients would be in wards not private rooms but it was temporary.

It also had a big apron in front of it that could take two or three VTOLs at a time. So, one landing, one unloading, and one leaving all the time. The warehouse had received semitrailers of furs from New York and Boston when it was operating. Storing the garments for customers of the furriers. Or the furriers themselves.

The materials section ran a temporary line for JP4, and brought in warehouse tugs that could tow aircraft.

Brockton General sent four surgical teams and one of their trauma shifts.

Danny nodded and went to the CIC run by the ex-navy guys who were working on the guns. He walked into a dark intense space with lit glass boards and people behind them writing or drawing backwards wearing headsets straight out of a war movie. Admiral Edward M Norton (retired) met him in front of the glass panel that had a map of the area of Boston drawn on it. "Good job. They fell right back into it. Like riding a bicycle. We don't have anything that will range, though some of the guns from Gloverton and our far northern most tower will with tinked munitions if they move south. Gloverton first of course. A hundred miles is the best we can do. We are linked into the PRT Brockton Bay CIC or whatever they call it. Through them to the Protectorate."

"Hell of a job clearing the area though. Bound to be collateral damage."

Danny nodded "The plan is to clear an area and run an Ash Beast attack on the Nine."

Ed smiled tightly "Given the time to clear an area probably the best plan. I talked to the boys in Gloverton about getting some anti air assets along the medivac routes. The Navy is going to let us have some Phalanx. They are flying in some from the surface warfare center and school. Price is us tinking them of course."

Danny nodded and grinned "Bye Bye Birdy. I hate to say it, but I hope we can get those in action. Well, no rest for the wicked. I'll stop back in later." Ed nodded and went back to the leather covered seat mounted on a pedestal in the center of the floor.

Danny ran into Taylor and Amy coming from the Union hall "Hey! Happy Birthday Taylor. Shouldn't you still be having it?"

Amy blushed and Taylor grinned and blushed "Break. Amy wanted to check her new domain."

Danny nodded "Don't get attached. It is going to lease to the PRT and Protectorate, two floors each."

Taylor smiled "Tax money coming back to us then. It is my birthday!"

Danny laughed and kissed her on the cheek then did the same to Amy with a 'thanks' in her ear. The two trotted off and Danny headed for the Union Hall and his office. He met New Wave minus Amy and Vicky on the way. Sarah looked at him "Fucking Nine, Way to fuck up a girls' sweet sixteen."

Danny shrugged "Not to be an ass but it could be worse."

Mark nodded "This is after all Brockton Bay. And the fight with Leviathan went way to damn easy. Only two dead? Its unheard of."

Danny frowned "Mark are you running training today?"

Mark nodded "For the wards. Taylors team will be around her and Amy. I already saw camera coons and brain queens out looking around on the way here. Sarah and the others are going to patrol in the absence of the protectorate capes who are all in Boston. I'll run the wards through some training then we will patrol with them. Boston's wards are coming in too. We can run some ward on ward games and then see how they integrate."

Everyone's phones suddenly spoke "Carnal deceased, Prophet deceased." In Dragons voice.

Carol blinked "Did this get classified as an Endbringer event?"

Danny shook his head "No idea, time to go look at the monitors and maybe talk to Dragon."

AP

"We didn't have time to pass out the armbands. I stole a page from Taylors playbook and coopted the phones. Yes, they are treating it as a Endbringer. Even so far as a truce and bringing the volunteer Villains. The protectorate and PRT are going all out here." Dragon answered a few minutes later. The phones said, "Mouse Protector is down." Dragon continued "It works even better. The phones have much more processing capacity. I see why you like this Taylor. I also see why it's a problem until they synch up."

Taylor nodded "At least they aren't alive and fighting you until they do."

AP

Amy looked at Mouse Protector and called "Taylor."

Taylor stepped over and swore "Bonesaw, the little fucking cunt."

Amy nodded "Well hopefully someone will put her down. Though they better have Shielder or a hazmat body bag. I bet she has some surprises in store. I told Director Piggot."

Taylor nodded "Some nice upgrades here. We should do a full job as we fix her."

Amy turned her head and a nurse held out the Endbringer release "Might as well, easier and quicker than taking her back to original. We can always undo it if she wants later. OK recording? Here we go them, Crushed pelvis-"

The hospital people had objected to the dogs until the infirmary staff set them straight. Rachel stood leaned on the wall. If a dog looked at someone twice they were on the floor spread eagle with a dog at each extremity and one at their throat before Vicky could get to them. Parian was off to the side with a giant lifelike bear and rhino measuring Hero's and her people were working up costumes before they went to the cafeteria for food and maybe a rest then caught a flight back. Smart dogs and brain Queens patrolled the patient wards with pairs of PRT troops.

Alec was in a tower with a rifle and Brian was patrolling with a Rottweiler that made him look small. Noelle was with Lisa and Dinah. Aisha was slipping around somewhere. Theo was with Danny.

AP

Hatchet face deceased, Ravager deceased, Purity down. Kreig Deceased, Rune down, Velocity down, Battery down. Cherish deceased, Mannequin deceased."

It was the second day, early in the afternoon. It wasn't a good day.

Amy took Purity and Taylor took Rune. The surgical teams still had Velocity and Battery.

"Alexandria down, Othala down."

"Thirty seconds to Ash Beast deployment. Ten seconds, clear area victor. Ash Beast deployed. Clear area Uniform. Fall back to two-mile zone. Snipers you are weapons free."

Amy and Taylor heard but couldn't look up. Siberian had turned Othala and Alexandria to hamburger.

"Flechete down. Siberian has disappeared. Eidolon down."

"What the fuck? What is Flechete doing there?" Taylor asked.

Vicky handed her another bottle of juice. "Lisa and her crew have been working. The Master had to be taken out to get rid of Siberian. Flechete, Alec, all the strikers are there looking for him. Vista is evacuating casualties. I guess they found him or her. Siberian was chopping up everyone. That is what brought the Ash Beast deployment on. How are Alexandria and Othala?"

Amy sat back slumping in her chair "Back together, physically. I think we all need a vacation though."

Vicky eyed them and looked at Rachel "Come on you two. It will be a couple hours before these folks get here. Let's lay you down for a while."

AP

Alexandria joined Legend flying over Boston's south side, or the ashes of it. "Christ what a mess. Who ordered the Ash Beast?"

"National Command Authority." Legend shrugged I'm glad we didn't make that call. Should you be up here?"

Alexandria sighed "Amy and Taylor want me back in twelve hours."

"Pay attention. Jack Slash can reach out to us. Don't stop moving either, not in the air. Bonesaw has made some improvements to herself and him. Crawler is Crawler. Apparently, a fist size piece and he can regenerate. He has done it twice that we have seen. All the parts crawl back together. Ash Beast is wearing them down but Jack still lashes out."

Alexandria nodded "Two of the rockets are here, on Lisa and Dinah's recommendation."

Legend smiled "Arthur said we had gone all New Wave."

Alexandria rolled her eyes "Tattletale and Delphi then. If we can get one disabled we will space them. Mark has worked out a team with Vista, Shielder, Laserdream, Uber, and L33T."

"Christ, the kids now?" Legend swore.

Alexandria smirked "Me and you too."

"How is David?"

"Doctor Mother has him at cauldron with about a hundred dog bites, and a broken jaw. He got snippy with Panacea, Kull stepped in. He turned on her, Bitch and Glory Girl took him down. I had Contessa come get him, before Kull chopped him up or Panacea killed him. He cannot be near those two, probably ever again." Alexandria relayed, then towed Legend along when he stopped in midair.

"What the fuck is wrong with him?" Legend shook his head.

Alexandria shook her head "I don't know but he isn't leaving Cauldron again until we figure it out."

AP

Vista screamed "Light the goddam fuse!"

Taylor nodded "I haven't got much longer." Her swarm was wearing a bit thin and Crawler recovered nearly as fast as everything poisonous, or that bit, in the greater Boston area could sting or bite.

L33t punched a button, the rocket beeped and showed a green light and a five second timer. Vista let go at one snapping them all back a half mile. They watched as Crawler lifted screaming until he went out of hearing range. He nodded "Let's see you regenerate on the sun you fuck."

AP

Four days into the fight, in full protective gear, and with Amy working nearly constantly to counter everything she did, Kull found Bonesaw. Jack Slash couldn't resist the fight with Ash Beast. He knew he was affecting him.

All of Bonesaw's spiders and whatever she had cobbled together in the pulverized, melted, burned rubble of the moonscape that had been south Boston were dead. Kull had been hunting for four hours, twice encountering Jack and making him decide Ash Beast was the better option. Kull moved so fast she appeared to be teleporting.

Kull found Bonesaw and popped the ash covered disheveled, exhausted, stumbling twelve-year-old into a titanium can and hit the button on the side. The can said "Auto launch sequence initiated. Five, four, three, gyro stabilization active," Kull sped away "Two, one. Ignition." The cylinder rose somewhat gracefully. As gracefully as a titanium fifty-five-gallon drum with a dome on top could really.

Kull got in the giant glove box. Amy put one bare hand inside. Vicky and Rachel airlocked organic matter into the box onto Kull and Amy touched Taylor. Taylor smiled "And then there was one."

Legend landed with Alexandria and looked at Amy anxiously. Amy smiled. They both relaxed.

Lisa trotted up "Jack is inside Ash Beasts area of effect. Time to affect our end game."

Dragon spoke from the phones "The circle is going up around him, the target portal is in place."

Legend asked "We are sure the wall will hold?"

Dragon replied "It's a monocrystal two hundred feet tall. He doesn't go up. The only way he can go is down and the wall is connected to the bedrock. That's the only thing he has never had effect on with his affects."

Lisa smiled "Good one."

Alexandria rolled her eyes "I think you all need a nap."

"Let me out of here." Taylor demanded.

"Hmmm. I think I like my Kull in a can. Where she can't run around coming up with crazy plans with little blond girls." Amy said firmly.

Lisa shrugged "Not so little." Everyone winced. Even the phones somehow gave that impression.

"Ellisburg portal opening in two minutes. Pathway portal is in place and operational. All personnel stand by for Ash Beast transit." The phones informed them.

Taylor shook her head lying on the floor of her glove box. "A nap sounds good. Are we sure those portal generators will live?"

Lisa shook her head. "No but it's worth trying. If they do we can go ahead with making them flight capable and linked. The test for that will be getting Ash Beast out of Ellsberg and to Mars. The Simurgh won't know what hit her."

Vista sighed "Poor Ash Beast will be so lonely."

Linda laughed "We'll give him an audio output hooked to a radio. You can talk to him every once in a while. Seriously? More lonely than he is now? He gets to see Mars! Plus, he helps us test the range on the teleportals. Theoretically infinite does not mean that in practice. Those capacitors are freaking amazing but they aren't generators."

Uber walked up beside her "He also helped us test the system that got the portal to Mars. Then we can improve it. We launched it on a bit of a lark and to get rid of an experiment that got a little high in the gamma emissions."

Vicky looked at him "So if a china syndrome is a little high, the sun is medium high? The big bang very high?"

Uber waved her off "Potato, Patato. Why do we have can o' Kull? We need to turn up the opacity on that too." Taylor was suddenly full Kull in the glovebox. Amy hit the control pad and the decontamination spray completely obscured the interior.

AP

The Governor of the Common Wealth of Massachusetts looked at the plan with his staff and then picked up his pen and signed the contract on the back of it "Get the DWU and the BBCU in here and get them working today. Massachusetts has always had strong unions this is nothing we haven't had before and maybe a turn to the good. Make sure they get everything they need. They have managed to hold onto Brockton Bay with the gangs gone they can hopefully do the same here. One gang we can deal with."

AP

Danny sat in the meeting in the cafeteria "I realize it's a big job. South Boston is a moonscape and the city infrastructure is, well, destroyed. What we are going to do is establish basic housing for winter as we build locals of the DWU divisions and the BBCU. So keep an eye out for good capable people and let's get them through the training courses here as quick as possible.

"Leviathan is down, so while we rebuild their harbor we will plan but not construct their sea wall. We will put the resources in place however. Make them bluffs overlooking the ocean and landscape them as parks.

"Apply the lessons we have learned here. Everything should work together and have redundancy if possible.

"While they are saying money is no object we know that isn't true so don't go nuts. The best materials fine. Custom made materials not so much."

Legend nodded "The Protectorate and PRT will provide all the assistance they can."

Danny nodded "A refinery, a recovery device for the harbor, a tank farm, power stations for electricity and steam, houses. The portals are up and running and the busses running between the Union Hall and Tents in the southside. Steampunk already has the heavy equipment on trains, so let's get cracking."

"Oh, one last thing. Overtime is not authorized. Work your eight, get back here and go to the beach or something. Safety first and it is Brockton Bay. Shit happens."

The summer of hard work and hard play got off to a shuffling, chuckling start. If you were alive the union found some kind of work for you, at a decent wage. If you were smart and a hard worker the union's made an offer. If you had a Corona Gemma, and quite a few people did, when Panacea checked you by shaking your hand when you were hired, you went to the BBCU. If not, even if you had a Corona Pollentia you went to the DWU. Minor powers were everywhere in places like Brockton Bay and Boston. Places where bad things happened and life was hard.

You got a job, then as your power was discovered your job changed so that the best use of your power could be made.

Those who did not want to be known as capes were listed as associates and their BBCU member number had an A in front of it. No one ever figured out how the decision as to which union you joined was made. After all who didn't want to go to the Union with the most girls. More females than males triggered.

Just because you triggered didn't mean you got a high level of ability with your power. Working with your power improved it, like exercise improved physical condition.

The BBCU did begin to pick up lots of high powered parahumans however. The protectorate began modifying their program to compete. It was a tough slog with both the Government and PRT being slow to change. If a young cape, or a cape period was set on being a hero though they were steered to the Wards and Protectorate. They did their protectorate training and duties then they helped rebuild Boston. The BBCU helped rebuild Boston first and did an hour or two a day on heroic cape business.

Taylor was on the beach reading a book on string theory surrounded by her crew doing the same kind of reading when a bleached blond flounced up and sat indian style "Taylor Hebert."

Taylor blinked "Yes?"

"Miranda Gossack, Seventeen magazine. Can we talk?"

Taylor sighed "Well I can and you apparently can. So, what does Seventeen want with me?"

Miranda tapped her chin "Hot as a blast furnace, President of the BBCU, rich as the US government, maybe the G7 and sixteen. What could we want, everything maybe, to be you, why yes, if not, to stand near you and know to what we can aspire?"

"OK so her power is bullshit." Lisa cracked.

Taylor sighed "Fine but if I don't answer don't push it. Or Bitch and Glory Girl will get upset."

Miranda looked around like she was just now realizing where she was. "OK. So, give us the details. What's it like being a triumvirate level goddess?"

Taylor flopped back and dropped her book on her stomach "Oh please no. Look I am just trying to find my place in the world. As for all that goddess stuff, hard work, good food from good raw ingredients and at least two hours of training a day. Look around, all these girls do the same thing and they are all just as hot. None of them are poor. They make good wages have good jobs and are great girls."

Miranda nodded "Oh we know, hopefully they will be glad to talk to us. Back to that good wages thing, the Union scale is public knowledge. Why is the least pay on it a hundred dollars an hour?"

Lisa answered "Base and fringe. The federal government gets thirty odd percent, depending on the state and any reciprocal tax agreements they have. A good round figure is forty percent in taxes, so that takes you to sixty dollars an hour. The Union gets fifteen. Medical, dental, meals, strike fund, legal. So we are down to fifty five. The retirement fund gets anywhere from five percent up. The worker decides. We recommend fifteen. So the worker is left with forty bucks an hour. You could live on that and your spouse not work so you could have children. We have day care but it isn't free so you can use that and both work. At the end of the day you will be lower middle class not rich. If you want more you have to study, practice, get experience, and test. Oh, and have a good work record."

Miranda nodded "Yes we did an analysis in last month's working girl section. I guess I asked that wrong, how do you get customers to pay it?"

Taylor spoke up "Quality of work. When the Union does a job its done to spec, in code compliance, and right the first time. That's what the training and supervision is about. Customers see the job speced out and estimated. One of the houses we are starting to build in Boston for example, All the materials and labor cost included are about forty dollars a square foot.

"The government has already paid to have the soil cleaned down to bedrock and we laid the utilities as we did that work. The City and State paid for us to lay light rail subway lines, streets, sidewalks drainage all the things needed. The lots people already owned. Now they pick a house, options for it, floors, central air, that kind of thing and color palette and we knock them out. every thousand houses get a power house down near bedrock that supplies electricity and steam. It's a trigeneration facility that dumps heat into the ground. Its more cost effective to do the building in the continuous process we have going." Gully a new addition, maybe three new additions, who had left the wards and joined the union that Taylor and Amy had optimized at her request, Spoke up. Gully was eight feet tall, more muscular than the Hulk and with her underbite and other issues corrected a nice smiling girl next door. Shaker ten plus, brute eight. She could move dirt in any way anyone could imagine up to and including being her own TBM with one of the vibration machines following her. Or in front of her even. All the new suburbs of Boston were hooked into its subway system now. The old ones were clamoring for it. All of the refinery and power plants were down at bedrock, including the tank farms. The tanks and facilities were all monocrystalline structures.

Miranda nodded "I toured the model neighborhood. It's amazing! And Taylor Hebert holdings or the BBCU REIT buying up every derelict property in Boston?"

Taylor smiled "Who doesn't want to live in a redevelopment designed by Arthur Simmons in Beantown?" Everyone chuckled. "Like Gully said, easier to do it in a process so the abandoned or vacant properties got bought and the houses built on speculation."

Vista snorted "All those people in California for one. To many clothes for them."

Aisha shook her head "Last time I show you a video of the beautiful people."

"They won't be so beautiful with pavement rash. Bikini's and blade skates, that is just stupid." Vista growled "Not like Parian can't make protective gear look good."

Amy smiled "Or bullet proof and in the catalog, online and mail order."

Miranda had an epiphany "That's why all of your wealth in Forbes is 'calculated'!"

Lucy shushed her "Shhhh. Us getting our pay checks and living on that is a secret. We plow all our money back into various projects. In thirty years, we may be able to buy and sell senators and congressmen. Right now, we are property and investment paupers." Miranda goggled at her. Everyone cracked up.

Miranda shook her head "The government paying the unions to clean down to bedrock and the unions keeping all the stuff that separated out, no member of the union is a pauper. The platinum from catalytic converters is estimated at a billion dollars."

Taylor shrugged "Which all goes back into the funds, recruiting, training, all of that. We get our wages at our graded rates."

Miranda eyed her "Profit sharing."

Lisa nodded "A little boost but it will be big in the out years. Say five years from now. Well for us charter members. Amy check her for powers, She has to be a thinker."

Toward the end of the day Miranda asked "OK, who is dating who and what is going on with Alexandria? Don't think I don't see all these delicious boys and girls hovering around." Taylor groaned. Miranda giggled "It is a magazine for teen girls. And Kull scares the crap out of our gossip columnist."

Rachel looked at Vicky "We have to work harder."

Vicky huffed "You would think taking down Eidolon would mean something." Rachel nodded and shrugged.

AP

Eidolon's therapist asked "Why were you reading a magazine for teen girls David? Just curious you understand."

"Bored. It's ridiculous! I'm a hero! I should be out doing heroic things!" David petulantly replied.

His therapist nodded "What kind of heroic things?"

AP

Rebecca landed on the balcony, walked into John and Arthurs apartment and flopped on the sofa. Arthur arched a brow. Rebecca huffed "I'm dating Danny Hebert."

Arthur chuckled "Staying for dinner in the cafeteria after meetings hardly constitutes dating Babe."

"I have feelings." Rebecca groaned.

Arthur blinked "Oh, my!"

"Shut up."

Arthur smiled "If he had Taylor all on his own your kid will rule the universe. Especially after Amy and Taylor get through with him or her. Oh Lisa!" Rebecca groaned and threw her arm across her eyes.

John walked in from the balcony and arched a brow. Arthur shrugged "Sweet young Rebecca has feelings for Danny Hebert."

"Get the fuck out! Oh, holy fuck! Taylor is going to kill you!" John spun to look at Rebecca.

Rebecca dropped her arm "At least you get it." Arthur glared at them both.

AP

Taylor looked at Dragon on her articulated arm "You're an AI. You want Amy to build you a body and the Union thinkers and Tinkers to help take down the Dragon Slayers. A super villain organization that has been persecuting you for years. Oh and you are in love with Colin, erh Armsmaster, which is what brought this particular bout of female logic on, which is why we are discussing it in a no boys zone."

Dragon smiled brightly "Your thinker is hot today. That was a very nice summation."

"Fuck me sideways."

"Let's get the normal ways done first sweetie. You might not like sideways."

"Amy!"

"What Taylor? Girls have problems. Girls help girls fix their problems. We need mom though and a bunch of her female lawyers. We can fuck these dragon slayers right in the ass."

"Oh, that's so much better than sideways, Up the pooper."

"They don't have vagina's Taylor."

"Amy!"

Amy ignored her "Dragon, this body needs to be fully functional? Child bearing and all?"

Parian tossed in "What ethnicity?

Lisa groaned and flopped down next to Taylor "Here we go."

AP

Faultline looked at the other women "What?" Labyrinth nodded along with her. After it was explained again Faultline sighed "You know, there is something wrong with women as a species. Dragon you want one of these oozing, aching, high maintenance, shell's? Have we gotten her to counseling? You know, like they do people who are doing gender reassignment?" Dragon gave her a glare. She held her hands up. "Saint. Well we could no doubt find him, but we can be connected to Taylor so that's no good." She drummed her fingers. Murderer you say? OK let's bump him up the most wanted list, I mean, since we turned the Ash Beast loose in the world we are kind of out of S classes for the moment. Or they aren't really worried about us, let's say. Talk his case up, ask a few questions Taylor, that will put him on everyone's top ten. Next, we get your dad to use his contacts to put a million-dollar contract out on Saint. That will make him break cover or will point us right at him. Then we wait and when he pokes his head up we chop it off.

"He is going to have to go anyway, word is he is tinker zero by way of Teacher. You know what happens to those people eventually. They become bots for teacher. Let him give you power and your fate is sealed.

"Now Dragon, Colin? Colin Wallis? Judge Dredd himself? You know half the villains in the Northeast use 'Armsmaster is a dick' as a passphrase, right?" Dragon blushed a bit, while pouting. The girls were rolling laughing.

Later in the week no one was laughing. They were tiptoeing around Taylor who finally rolled her eyes and barked "Stop that! It's one date. Maybe getting laid will chill her out. Might relax Dad a bit too. She is hot enough, he deserves a break and some relaxation. They are grownups and I am sixteen. It's not like I am five and she is going to replace my mom or some after school special shit."

Lucy nodded rapidly "Good. Now Tyrone and Piggot?"

Taylor wrinkled her nose "That's just weird. Tyrone lost his mind."

AP

"Incoming Ash Beast in three, two, one." The heroes all watched the explosion fall on top of Behemoth and went back to evacuating people from New Deli.

Taylor looked up from the casualty she was treating and grunted "There won't be any rebuilding this. It's all going to be radioactive."

Amy smiled at the child she was working on as it stopped crying and looked around "Yes they might have to just quarantine it. Did you read that thinker report? Ash Beast Hero classification. Supposedly he enjoys this stuff. When he is done he just stands until they put a portal down then he walks to it and fights whatever it is wherever it drops him."

Taylor nodded "And we thought Brockton Bay was strange. He does have a good record though. The Nine, Nilbog, The Sleeper, and he apparently made the three bitches wish they were dead.

"We should drop him on Baltimore."

Amy laughed "Cleaning up that did make Danny and Rebecca a couple. I thought you didn't mind."

Taylor shuddered "Parents should not have sex. Ever. Especially parents who are tuned up as far as they can be, and with flying bricks." Amy had to take her hand off the child she was treating. "It's not funny. I can't even sleep in my room with my girlfriend!"

Amy nodded "Or her sister. Vicky still can't look at either one of them."

Taylor eyed her "Didn't bother you."

Amy shrugged "I know how Rebecca feels. I want to scream too. You Hebert's' are dangerous."


End file.
